Unfair Punishment
by TaigaKunaix
Summary: We all know how Zamasu doesn't like humans right; Imagine him having to stay a full *year* amongst one of them? Yup. Well very... interesting things happen, and things that he never even thought would happen ended up happening anyway. "I really, really hate you." [Zamasu/OC, rated M for future chapters and swearing]
1. The Agreement

**You know what, lemme just try to apologize for how this story will soon become.**

 **Actually… I'm not** _ **that**_ **sorry.**

 **This is a DBS fanfic, starring Zamasu and an OC.**

 **No, this is definitely not canon. Do not castigate me for such either please. With that being said, enjoy!**

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 **The Agreement**

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"This is for the better, Zamasu."

Sure, it is.

"I want you to get to learn about humans."

 _Sure, you do._

And he did, really. But Zamasu didn't want anything, and he'll repeat, _anything_ to do with humans at all. Such creatures were both too sensitive and insensitive simultaneously. How does that even make sense?

"Gowasu-sama." He took a deep breath, "How could making me… babysit a _human_ , guarantee that I learn something from that species?"

Gowasu sighed. "Have you ever came into contact with any human?"

"No." _And I don't want to._

"Exactly. And this isn't babysitting, but I want you to actually communicate with them, it will help you understand your feelings."

Zamasu stayed quiet. For some reason, he could never ever argue with Gowasu to the point where his mentor would raise his voice. In fact, he can't even remember the last time Gowasu actually _did_ raise his voice. But either way, he didn't want to spend time with a member of such a troubling species, they cause nothing but conflicts and could never negotiate peace. Doesn't Gowasu not see that?

"How _long?_ " The Shinling could've drawled out that last word. Hopefully it wouldn't be long, like maybe a minute, or thirty seconds better yet.

"You'll be close with another human for a year."

Can the Kaioshin get red in the face? Zamasu literally felt like he popped a vessel.

"...A-a year?"

"Yes."

"...An entire year?"

"Yes."

" _Three hundred and sixty five days_?"

" _Yes_."

Gowasu was so firm with this idea, that Zamasu wondered if he was choosing to ignore the more than scornful look on his face.

"But Gowasu-sama-"

"This is for the benefit of you, Zamasu. You are far from becoming a god, you need to learn many things before you reach such a stage. And since you are too passionate with humans, I want you to stay with one of them."

Is he trying to say that he was inept at being a god because he cared about an entire species? Care is even a weird word to use for _humans_ , he simple didn't like how they acted; upon violence and rebuke. Not that he'd care about them at all. Zamasu's eyes twitched; an entire year, existing alongside humans? Is that even possible?

Thinking about even made Zamasu angrier.

"Are we clear?"

The sudden clarity in Gowasu's voice made Zamasu flinch slightly, and he knew right then and there that there was no way he could possibly get out of this. Once Gowasu administered such a tone of voice, that meant he wasn't taking no for an answer.

Reluctantly, and almost painfully, Zamasu nodded his head. "Yes, Gowasu-sama."

"Good. I will contact the human that you will be associated with again." Gowasu stood from his seat, pushing the chair in the table. Zamasu still sat there, and Gowasu just sighed at him.

"You may go now."

The Shinling looked up at his mentor, who was now walking away with his hand behind his back. Zamasu stood slowly; at this point, he could only hope that he would be sane after all of this.

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It isn't her first day waking up to an alarm clock. It really isn't, she's spent countless days sleepless, or even only getting less than an hour of sleep a day. But today, or this morning rather, the alarm clock sounded like they were going to shoot a missile out of her phone. Like how anyone would react to such a situation, she sloppily reached and tapped at the screen of her phone until the loud noise would stop. Pushing her kiny hair away from her eyes, Irene slowly sat up on her bed and stretched. With one single look at her phone, the time that it displayed made her groan loudly.

 _Nine-thirty-goddamn four in the morning._

Why was the alarm even set so early again? _Oh… riiiight_ , she sighed, _I have a piece to finish_.

Irene loved to draw, a lot; so much so that she'd skimp on sleeping for a single project. There were times when she would paint for hours, until the sun sets or until the moon falls, running on nothing but inspiration and water. For some reason, the five hours of sleep she got tonight wasn't enough to sate her energy level even though it was solely for the purpose of drawing.

She yawned and it felt like her mouth was velcroed or something. _I probably look like a damn orge right now_. She brushed her teeth, and did her morning routine. She pulled off her purple satin bonnet and shook her unruly curls free. She made the mistake of not tying her hair before bed several hours ago, and now her hair needed to be detangled. _I ought to skip that shit… Ima do it later_. She made her way into the kitchen, stopping to grab her phone off of her sofa, and she settled for something simple: pancakes with eggs and a glass of orange juice.

Irene's house wasn't small, but it wasn't mansion-status either. Her living room was lofty, the wall was a light honeydew hue, but the many portraits that hung on the walls colored the large room. Most of these works she actually bought, and some of them were her own, one of which being a large nearly four-feet long oil-painted landscape of a verdant forest. There were three bedrooms including her own, each of which had enough space to comfortably fit sofas in it. Her kitchen had quartz-white tiles, and the counters were made of granite.

Her works on the walls would cost millions because Irene happened to be a profound artist in possibly the most socially inconvenient way possible. Someone of her caliber would go to college first to study more on art and whatnot, getting a diploma as a token to their knowledge in art. She did go to art college however, for about a month and dropped out because she was doing everything else _but_ drawing what she wanted.

That was seven years ago, and in those seven years she's made more than what her student loans would probably be had she decided to stay. Ever since then, art has been what she mainly did for a living, and she was making a pretty damn good one at that. For today, her work could wait because now she wanted, and had the luxury to relax. Literally she could spend the entire day in her house being entertained, anyway. After she finished her breakfast, Irene placed her empty plates in the sink, and commenced to washing the dishes. A text message popped up on her phone, and she slid her thumb down the screen.

 _From: Becca_

 _Heyyy, what you doing?_

"It's damn near ten in the morning." She snorted. Rebecca was Irene's best friend for a good twelve years, they grew up together through middle and high school. Unlike her though, Rebecca went to college, and she majored in medical science.

 _To: Becca_

 _I'm skydiving, fam._

Well it was pretty close to what she was doing right now, wasn't it?

 _From: Becca_

 _Omg please… I wanted to invite you to hangout with the crew._

 _To: Becca_

 _Really? Today?_

 _From: Becca_

 _No like, two days from now. I already know you're gonna be tired tomorrow._

 _To: Becca_

 _You know what, you ain't even wrong lol. I'm fit for it then, I'll see you in two days._

It would a pretty good idea for her to actually rest tomorrow, now that she thought about it. Time eludes her so much, her sleep schedule was almost always random. The next two days would probably past like the thirty minutes you'd spend in math class.

A weird sound was heard in her living room. She blinked once and turned around cautiously, she took steps towards the living room. One, two, she jumped forward to the opening of the living room, and was about to lunge at whoever dared to run their shit in her house; what she didn't expected was to see the old dude with white hair that was side-parted to the right. He had black eyes and a pair of pretty green earrings, and was wearing a weird outfit along with boots.

She knew who he was, he spoke with her before but she kind of forgot his name. She was told that he was something called a Supreme Kai, akin to a god in a way. With the way he was dressed, it's at least ninety degrees outside, how the hell is he wearing a long sleeve sweater and baggy pants, and not dying in the heat? The dude looked like he was prone to back pains.

He cleared his throat. "I do wish to apologize for my intrusion in your home."

Irene shrugged. "It isn't the first time, but it's fine." _I just realized that I have nothing on underneath this robe, hopefully he won't notice that._ "You can sit down."

"Well, I just came for a short notice. I wanted my pupil to come and communicate with you for some time, as a way for him to learn about humans."

"Oh…" Scratching the back of her head, she fingered the sleeve of her robe. That didn't seem that bad. "For how long though?"

"A year."

"And how old is he? I have to babysit for a year?"

"It isn't babysitting. He is far older than you are."

"Ohhh, so…" Irene gestured with her hands as she spoke. "I mean, I kinda have no problem with it." Would that be really weird to admit? Allowing somebody you don't know in your house for a year? "Don't tell me dude has temper problems, guy-uhh…"

"Gowasu."

"Gowasu." _That_ was his name.

"And no, Zamasu is very calm. I simply want him to speak with you and understand humans through experience."

Irene nodded. The first time they spoke implied that there would be something he needed from her which was like a week ago. Now he tells her that there will be a year-long visitor in her house. What kind of experience did he need, though? So many questions went through her mind.

"He will be coming here in two days."

She was brought back by the sound of Gowasu's aged voice. " _Two_ days? Oh, I have somewhere to go in two days! Can it be like… a night or something? I'll be busy through the afternoon."

Gowasu raised his eyebrows, but nodded nonetheless. "Very well. I thank you for this, hopefully Zamasu will learn from this." With that, Gowasu raised his hand and vanished from her house and Irene was left to think about the possibilities for this certain person. She had enough time for this, so much can be done in 48 hours, like watch a bunch of random movies and bake and eat cookies all day.

 _Two days… Well, it can't be that bad..._

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 **This adventure has** _ **juuuuust**_ **got started...**

 **Since there was no category for DBS, this would have to be here. I hope you enjoy this chapter!**


	2. First Impressions

**Quick question; how does one add a character's name to the character category in ? Is it possible?**

 **Feel free to answer that question if you know so. Anyways, on with the story!**

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 **First Impressions**

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Once again, Gowasu took his last, slow sip of his tea as Zamasu stood quiet, patient. His eyes were on his mentor's delighted face but his mind kept trailing somewhere else.

Why did the last two days pass by so fast? This would have seemed pretty redundant, because Zamasu lived for thousands of years, and a mere century seemed like a blur. Literally, it felt like a few hours ago when he had this conversation of _visiting_ a human with Gowasu. If only he had time to-

Well what could he do other than wait? If anything, had the last two days passed by like a turtle traveling across a room, he probably would've been itching to just get this 'learning experience' over with. The last thing he wanted was to walk amongst the same beings who can barely deal their cards with diplomacy.

"Zamasu."

The Kaio blinked at the sudden sound of Gowasu's voice. His mentor continued, "You are not to injure, or kill any of the humans you come in contact with, especially the one that I assigned you with. I've already told her enough about you, don't make her second guess your persona."

 _Great, this human has standards of me now._ "Okay."

"Observe their behavior. Hear what they say. Actually speak to her, if you will."

His eyebrow twitched. "Okay."

"I'm sure you will get the most out of this. It will help you in the long run."

"I understand." Zamasu nodded, taking back the teacup that Gowasu gestured towards. He had several questions already as to whoever Gowasu picked, but he decided it would be best to leave it until he actually saw them. Apparently, he caught wind that it was a woman and that's… pretty much all that was indicated.

He might as well ask, he didn't really want to be surprised. "What is she like?"

"She is a very nice lady. Her name is Irene. I spoke with her twice and it seems like she has a bit of a creative side to her."

 _..Meaning?_ "What do you mean by that?"

"The first time I visited the woman, she had this colored substance all over her hands and face which she told me was called paint. She told me that she was an artist, and introduced me to several of her works. I think she'd fare very well with you."

Zamasu nodded slowly. "I don't know I mean, a _year_?"

"You need all of that time to understand them."

Yup, there was no way he could negotiate out of this. All he had to do now was wait until he was supposed to meet her.

That already sounded painful.

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How could Red Robin fries taste so good? Irene was pretty sure she had at least three refills of these fries, and she had long since finished her burger.

"You see, if those refills weren't free, you would have increased the bill tenfold."

She threw a straw wrapper at her friend, who slapped it away before it hit him. "Shut up, Adrian."

"For real though," Rebecca had to pause and chew her burger before speaking again, "Did you not eat all day or some shit?"

"She was probably too busy being a multi-millionaire artist." Jay sat in the far right off the booth, swirling his straw inside of his cup as he made his sarcastic remark.

She was readying another piece of paper to throw at Jay now. "I'm not a multi millionaire, I'm a uh…"

"Does a 'several hundred-thousand-aire' even exist?" Adrian leaned forward with a comical 'Hmm' after his question.

"Remember the last time that painting you made sold for like 10 million? Yeah, I'm pretty ten means _multi_ , because it's more than _one_ million so," Jay raised his arms and gestured, "there we go."

Rebecca leaned towards Jay who sat across from her and Irene. "That's only one dumbass painting!"

"She sold a bunch that were more than a mill-"

"Why are we having this conversation?" Adrian raise a sane question that Irene was _just_ about to inquire, all the while snaking his hand into her fries and grabbing one. She literally whipped over to his hand and grabbed his wrist, he winced at her vice grip. "...Damn it's that serious? You looking at me like you wanna eat my hand too."

"She probably might." Rebecca chimed in and Irene flicked her arm.

"Okay, to be truthful, I haven't since umm… earlier today?"

"Which is _when_?" Jay raised an eyebrow.

"Like five in the morning."

"The _hell_ are you doing up at five? My ass is sleeping and shit."

"That's because you don't do anything _but_ sleep." Rebecca glared at Jay, who gave her a face that made her laugh.

"Okay, Ms. Doctor Who, I do my work _first_ so I can chill and be the potato you all know for the rest of the day."

"Can you let go of my arm now?"

Irene turned back to Adrian, whose wrist was still in her grasp. She let go slowly, and Adrian quickly tossed the fry in his mouth much to her immediate dismay. "You owe me a fry now."

"I was helping you out there, okay." He raised his hand, using the other to smooth out his curly hair.

These were the three stooges in her life, if that even made sense. Adrian was like a brother to her, they've know one another since the third year of high school. Jay on the other hand was a friend of Adrian's; she met him in a video chat with her good guy friend a couple years ago and she lowkey shipped the two, _but we ain't gonna talk about that._ Finally, Rebecca was her best friend. They go way back, like middle-school-years back. Almost every day after school, they'd chill at either one of their houses. Now, even after college, Rebecca still kept in touch with her as well as Adrian, she could even say they got closer now that they weren't in school anymore.

She studied in the medical science field, and was a doctor. Adrian and Jay were both really affluent music producers; they worked together several times and she was an artist. The whole squad was just about as great as they could get.

"You guys want dessert though? Irene?" Jay gave her an accusing look.

"I think I might explode if I eat anymore than what I ate just now."

"I don't understand how you eat so much in so little time and still not gain weight?" Rebecca tilted her head.

"Word, she's been 135 pounds all year long and she eats more than me."

"Okay that is a _stretch_ , Adri." Jay turned to him, "Every fucking time I go to your house, you're either eating cereal or some other shit."

"You come to my crib every afternoon, what do you expect? It's lunchtime, bitch."

Adrian's voice did this thing where it would raise with every emphasized word, and Jay does the same exact thing. "You even ate my damn chips that I saved all day after work."

"Wait… What chips?"

"Oh my fu- this happened _last week_! I was saving a big bag of Cheetos and you came in and ate it all before I could tell you."

"...Those were yours?"

Jay literally sat up real quick in his seat. "Boy, don't act all innocent. _You knew, you fucking knew._ "

"My dude…" Adrian raised his hands in what he liked to call 'Roast Formation', "You could buy another bag- and this shit happened last damn week! You telling me in seven days you couldn't just up and cop another one?"

"Can you two shut up?" Rebecca's calm voice cut through the guys' heated conversation.

"We're supposed to be leaving and you guys are arguing about a dollar-bag of chips." Irene zipped up her purse after paying her split amount of money.

"What time is it?" Jay looked down at Adrian's phone, because he may have been too lazy to take his own out. "Oh shit, it's nine. We gotta bounce." Jay paid his piece, and stood up. He turned, paused, and looked at Adrian. "Move."

"Bruh, ask politely next time." _These two, I swear._ They exited Red Robin, both Jay and Adrian parting their ways from the girls, and Irene got into Rebecca's car. Since she offered to pick her up, Irene didn't need to drive this time.

Their ride wasn't even that long, or maybe it was just the fact that they were talking nonstop. They were just about to turn up the street, right in front of Irene's home.

"So what are you gonna do tonight, because I'm sure you can't even sleep with such a full stomach."

At the mention of that, Irene remembered the little agreement that she and Gowasu made over his pupil. She honestly hoped that they weren't waiting for her in there, _or rather that they are in my house by now anyways._

"I'm probably gonna Netflix my way to sleep. I don't know, or I might just paint stuff." She opened the door, stepping out of the car. "Ima see ya when I see ya." She took a few steps forward, and gave Rebecca a wave as she drove away. Now it was time to meet her new 'roommate', so to speak. She stepped into the house, and to her surprise, there was no one in the living room. She didn't hear anything, so they might not be in her house.

 _Now just in case if they pop on anytime soon, I should take a quick shower while I'm at it._

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"Zamasu." There was only one reason why Gowasu would call him so suddenly.

 _Dammit._

Well actually, there could be two reasons, one of which being that he wanted more tea and the other he didn't really want to state. Zamasu didn't take his time to go to the grand room that Gowasu was in, but he didn't particularly rush either.

Opening the ivory colored doors, the Kaio took one step in, then another, and turned around to close the door. He walked towards his mentor with his hands behind his back and face neutral as usual until he was in front of Gowasu. At this point he was more than eager to hear that he was to make tea again.

"It is time."

He purposely averted the obvious meaning to that statement; _...Tea time?_

Gowasu stood up, and walked past Zamasu, his hands also grasped behind his back. "We will leave now. The woman told me that she wished for us to come b-"

Zamasu didn't even fully listen to what Gowasu was saying, because he was _already_ mustering up the energy he needed to calm himself down for this new encounter. Time always seemed to speed up on times that he didn't want it to and vice versa, and for being alive for thousands of years, he should expect two simple days to go by like a mere second would in an entire hour. But he didn't want to, and he didn't want to go right now.

Okay, maybe, just maybe he was being a little too irritated by this; he really needed to be indifferent. Zamasu hadn't even met the human being yet and he was already feeling heated, imagine how hard it would be for him to be within a tangible two foot radius with them? For his benefit, he'd ought to just do this and just let it roll off of him. Besides, he's thousands of years old; a year probably wouldn't hurt him, at least he hopes not.

"Zamasu."

 _What?_ "Huh?"

"Did you hear me? Let's go now."

He just nodded. "Hai."

Instantly, they teleported straight into the planet of Desna, inside of a house to be specific. A rather big room with soft, mahogany cushioned chairs as he called it, a glass table in the middle, and a large black screen attached to the pale green wall. What caught his eyes were the decorations around the room; there were vases with cherry blossoms, and large pictures on the wall that he assumed was what Gowasu was talking about earlier. Grey eyes scanned around the room for the several seconds he had to do so until Gowasu called out to the human's name. Something told him that whoever this person was, they were considerably rich, but he wasn't about to prejudge them in the first place, already he felt like he was not going to come close to liking his at all. That may have counted as prejudice, but that's besides the point.

He and Gowasu turned to the sound of footsteps going down the steps, the woman was looking at and tapping a handheld device. Zamasu took in her appearance briefly; jute colored skin, _very_ curly hair that could've resembled a lion's mane, and dark brown eyes. She was wearing baggy pants and a red shirt. She stood in front of them and looked between the Kaioshin.

"'Ey, Gowasu. Hold on, let me put my phone down." She slipped the device in her pocket, nodded towards Gowasu, and turned to Zamasu. "Is this the dude you were talking about?"

Not even three sentences from her and he was already feeling iffy on this whole thing. Judging from how nonchalant she was about meeting two _gods_ , he was starting to question the so-called effectiveness of this 'experience'. Gowasu on the other hand smiled at her while Zamasu continued to frown.

"Irene, this is my pupil, Zamasu." He gestured towards the green Kaio. "I have told him all he needs to know. What stands in the way now is for you to introduce each other." Zamasu caught that flicker in Gowasu's eyes that silently told him to do exactly what he said. The Kaio sighed heavily, and looked back at the woman.

"Hello." Was all he could say. He didn't even extend his hand, nor step forward, nor did he crack even a smirk. Just a simple, plain, bland, sort of _cold_ 'hello'. Gowasu glared at him, and the woman blinked but she seemed to push his attitude past her.

"Hey, nice to meet you." She smiled. "I am pretty sure that we'll get along pretty well, he's pretty cool with me."

Either she was being sarcastic, or she was too daft to catch how acrid he was just now. Gowasu nodded and turned so that he stood between the two. "I know this will be of his best interests."

 _No it won't._

"Zamasu, please bear with this. Do not mistreat this opportunity. Learn from this, and I mean it."

Zamasu looked down, the urge to deny that this wasn't an opportunity was strong. "I will, Gowasu-sama."

"Very well. I must take my leave now." He gave a final bow to both Zamasu and Irene, and vanished as instantly as they both came. There was a pause, silence between the two for a good couple of seconds until the human opened her mouth again.

"So…" she leaned forward while clasping her hands together, "I know he said my name once, but I'll say it again; my name is Irene." She had her hand on her chest referring to herself. "You can umm… chill around here or something. I literally just came from a little hangout, and I might check out in a couple hours, you can just kinda," she shrugged, "make yourself comfortable, I guess."

Zamasu looked down at her; the woman was shorter than him, even her hair didn't make it past his forehead. He blinked at her, obviously disinterested, and turned around to walk towards the wall without a word.

Irene raised her finger and then put it back down in thought. _I'm pretty sure he speaks the same language as me if his teacher does too_. It really wouldn't make sense if the man couldn't speak the same language as her. "...I assume you took my suggestion." Silence. " _Okayyyy_."

He didn't turn around, but he heard her walk back upstairs after about a minute. At least she actually left him alone, right now he really didn't want to speak to her especially if she was to act like _that_.

 _How disrespectful_ , he wasn't some sort of colleague that she could just mind with little heed like that. He was older than her, _much_ older by the thousands, does she just think she could speak to him and Gowasu like that? But then again, he shouldn't have been that surprised, it was obvious that humans held little to no honor. He found himself staring at a picture, a portrait of a dark blue sky over a waterfall. Hopefully this will be the only bit of contact he'll have to be dealing with for the rest of the week.

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 **Obviously this wouldn't be on a good note, at all. And yes, jute is a color.**

 **I'm wondering if I should post a link to how our girl Irene looks like? I do have a faceclaim in mind for her.**

 **In the next chapter, best believe we will have them actually talk to each other, and best believe Irene's going to start being much more comfortable around him, meanwhile Zamasu's like a picket fence.** _ **This will be fun.**_


	3. We're Just Getting Started

**School has been drudgery over the course of a week… I apologize for the delay of chapters! Real quick, this sparked up from a review that I read;**

 **Yes Irene and her friends are very successful people, but they aren't as 'high' (arrogant or something along that line is a more accurate word) than you'd think. They are much too humble and it may seem like I gassed it a little bit due to how chill they are, but I didn't think I'd have to add any interactions with people who know them in the earlier chapters. That may be coming up in the future though!**

 **I did say real quick didn't I? That was damn near an entire paragraph-you know what, let's just get on with the story.**

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 **We're Just Getting Started**

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Irene didn't wake up to an alarm this time, she kind of just… did. It was around eleven in the morning and the woman was still full after yesterday with her friends. She stretched and yawned, swinging her legs off the bed and finally standing. If it weren't for the fact that she was more than aware that someone was in her house, she would've assumed that she was alone due to how quiet it was. _Was she?_

In fact the guy, Zamasu was his name, was acting damn near salty yesterday, and she found herself questioning what she could have possibly done to even get that from him. It wasn't like she insulted him or anything far as as she knew, but Gowasu told her ahead of time that he would be a bit difficult since he's never hung around human beings before.

 _Difficult never meant stank, did it?_

He had a bit of an attitude with her within the first _thirty minutes_ of them meeting each other. At first Irene didn't want to say anything about it, but she knew she might check it if he did so again. She took enough time to brush her teeth, and fixed up her hair for the sake of her time later, then made her way to the other rooms. She assumed that he probably slept much later than she did because she didn't hear him walking up the stairs last night, so she checked each of the two guest rooms only to find that he wasn't in either one of them. _Okay, so he's downstairs then._

And he was. She turned as she walked down the stairs, and saw him sitting in her kitchen looking down at the granite counter. Irene continued to walk towards the kitchen, intent on somehow getting his attention just so it wouldn't be one-sided _again_.

"Good morning." Her voice was light hearted and calm as usual. She smiled a bit but it dimmed back down when she noticed he didn't even look at her. And it soon turned into a frown when she saw his eyebrow twitch. She placed her hand on the counter and tilted her head.

"You know, you haven't said anything to me since yesterday other than 'Hello'." No response, he just sat straight and looked away. "Look, if you're going to be here for an entire year, you can't expect me _not_ to talk to you, and _vice versa._ " She added that last past in because how in the hell would he be here without speaking to her in her house?

He still hasn't said anything, so Irene sat upon the counter and surprisingly that did catch his attention. He looked up and down at her with his eyebrows arched in a condescending way.

"Why are you sitting on a table?"

The first thing he tells her isn't good morning, but rather why she is sitting in her countertop? _Okay_. "Well, I am always comfortable in my house." She leaned forward slightly, which made him back up a bit. "And I think you should be too." _You know, for the sake of both of us._

"I could never be comfortable around beings like you." He stood up, both his hands on the table like he was in a damn debate.

"The hell's that supposed to mean?" She didn't sound angry at all really, and that probably confused and annoyed him even more.

"You _humans_ run around dirtying the universe with your lack of diplomacy."

...He literally sounds akin to an extra-left liberal right now. "Umm…" How was she supposed to answer that? "I don't know what you're talking about dude, I d-"

"My name is _Zamasu_."

" _Okay Zamasu,_ I don't know what you're talking about. I never traveled around the universe so…" she scratched the back of her head.

"You simply do not understand," he shook his head, "all your kind does is instigate fights with one another."

She almost snorted. "Bruh, you're arguing with me _right now_."

Zamasu's eye twitched. "I'm not one of you."

"But still, either way, you're arguing with me right now aren't you? I'm not starting shit." Irene was the type of woman who didn't normally hold her tongue as she slowing stopping to now; she became so comfortable with being herself that at this point, there was no need to put a front on who she really was. And that was another thing that Zamasu was going to learn one way or another.

Speaking of whom, he looked at her with a face that literally spelled 'disrespectful', and turned away from her again, and Irene wasn't having it this time.

"You can't just start something and then leave it like th-"

"Don't put your _hands_ on me, human!" Zamasu pulled away the second her fingers even touched his shoulder, and she almost flinched because of the heated look on his face. He damn near made it look like she was trying to stab him or something. Did he really hate humans _that_ much?

"I don't want you going ape shit on me, okay." Irene had to pause in speaking because she was kind of scared of his look. When she said 'ape shit' he looked like a popped a blood vessel. "...If you're going to learn from this as your teacher told me, then you're gonna have to deal with me talking and touching you." Because how else was she going to communicate with him?

Zamasu sat back down and let out a frustrated sigh, something that he'd surely be doing for the next three hundred sixty four days. "Fine then."

Irene didn't want to argue, so she moved on from the debate that she didn't start. She walked past him and opened her cabinet, grabbing a bag of all-purpose flour. She plopped it into the counter in front of her underneath the cabinet, and sighed heavily.

 _Who does she think she is?_ How could she not be at least a bit respectful in the face of the Kaio himself? Zamasu's frown didn't leave his face. Irene spoke up again. "I'm about to make breakfast. Do you want some pancakes?"

Her voice sounded tired, and Zamasu blinked at her, obviously offended. "I don't eat human food."

"I'm pretty sure you're going to need _something_ in your stomach." _You twat._ "I can't have you starving in here because you hate the shit out of my species." _Okay, Irene, he's just a little umm… uppity is a nice word. He'll probably lighten up sometime._ Gowasu told Irene that Zamasu was highly intelligent. _He'd be intelligent enough to not be like this._ Ain't he a grown ass man?

Zamasu didn't want to eat human food. Such things were already despised, and with her attitude he was sure this woman couldn't even cook decently.

"So is that a yes or a no?"

Is she stupid? "It is an obvious no." Zamasu voice was surprisingly calm and that contrasted his mood so much. "What makes you think that I would eat from you?"

She already figured that, but she still didn't want a hungry dude in her house. At this point, she figured already that he didn't like humans _obviously_. But how would that stop her from being the Irene that she is?

 _That's right, it won't._ And it takes a lot for something to make her stop being so.

She made six pancakes just in case if he decided to change his mind and call her a scumbag just for not considering his elastic-ass decisions. Her plate consisted of three perfect golden brown pancakes, they steamed making the butter on top melt as the syrup dropped down the soft tower. Zamasu wasn't even looking at her as she cooked, when he heard the sound of a plate against the table, a warm, sweet aroma hit his nose. He accidentally oozed his attention on her pancakes for a little longer than usual for they actually looked kind of… Appealing.

"...And you're staring now."

Zamasu blinked, his eyes flickered to her, and then he finally stood and left the kitchen silently.

Irene's sigh was even heavier now; it was obvious that the man didn't like her one bit, and the possibility of him eve doing so is slim to none so far. She'll have to be more assertive if he was gonna stay at her crib with an attitude like that. But right now, _Ima just finish my pancakes._

«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»

Thirty-three minutes.

That was the time he spent in that kitchen with that woman.

Zamasu spent a good six minutes in the living room, doing everything in his power to _not_ succumb to that alluring smell. His eyes watched the clock on the wall. At first he refused to go upstairs. But now he wanted to be as far away from her as possible, and up those stairs sounded like a more-than wonderful escape. He nearly fast-walked, his poise still straight, upstairs and was met with a hallway. The hallway had beige colored walls that almost seemed to have a gradient, as well as paintings and such on said walls. The floor was soft carpet, he was pretty sure he would feel it curl with his toes if he didn't have his boots on, and there were four white doors which he assumed were the bedrooms.

"Oh, I almost forgot..." He heard her damned voice downstairs again rapidly getting closer to the stairs. He saw her head peek from the black rail. "I didn't give you a house tour yet. I should have showed you around the place last night." Now she was walking upstairs. He felt the urge to say _I have my own eyes,_ but he knew it was unlike him to simply roam around someone else's house. He didn't go by such behavior.

Irene reached the floor of the hallway, and look up at Zamasu. "So, I have two guest rooms. The one over there," she pointed to the farthest door on the right, "and that one right there," her finger now to the closest door on the left. "You can choose either one of them to sleep in or keep your clothes and all that jazz." Then she stepped forward and placed her hand on the closest door to his right. "This is the bathroom. And that," she pointed to the last door,"Is my room. Do not go in my room, because that's my private space. I don't think you would do that though."

 _Why would I ever want to step foot in your wretched room, you sc-_

"That's all you need to know."

Zamasu wasn't oblivious to what the living room looked like, but he saw a door adjacent to the outside kitchen wall. It was white, just like the others, but there were little lines in varying shades of green all painted in a wavy design. "What about the door downstairs?"

She was about to go back downstairs, but she turned around. "Hmm?"

"That green door downstairs," he repeated himself, "what is that for?"

"Oh, well…" Irene started walking towards him with a tiny smile on her face. "That's my studio."

He raised an eyebrow and she continued. "That door leads to the room where I paint and draw and stuff. Since I'm an artist, I don't have enough room to keep all my supplies in my own room, so that's what that room is for. You don't need to worry about that." Her face started to light up as she looked around the wall. "A lot of those portraits you see on the walls were either drawn by me or someone else. That large one on the wall I drew too." Zamasu looked to where she pointed, a large painting of a wooden room that was illuminated by natural lighting. There were things scattered around the room, like paintbrushes, cups, and a ladder that was perched against the wall. He didn't say anything, and Irene dropped her hand. "And also, if you need anything, just call me, _seriously."_ She put extra emphasis on the last word because she figured he wasn't going to go to her for help.

And he wasn't, he never would go to her for help, but she'd always end up coming to him before he even needed it.

Irene walked back downstairs, and was just about to go and work on a project when her phone made a notification sound. It wasn't uncommon for her to get emails of requests and whatnot, commissions were still below the deadline, which was in a week. She is surprised at how much she realized she had to do, especially when out of her element. _It would be best if I just do what I do best, and let the green dude off on his own._ _Yep, that salty-ass green apple-_ Honestly didn't bother her as much as she thought it would, or as much as it was supposed to, all she had to do was be as straightforward and herself as much as possible.

He'll get used to it.

«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»«o»

It has been about two days since their last hangout, and in those two days Adrian still couldn't find the right kick for a track. He leaned back and placed his hands over his curly head of hair, propping his legs on the table, his white sneakers barely touching the MIDI keyboard.

A gesture for him meaning 'I am rethinking my hours working on this.'

Well, more like he couldn't get one single component of a song and now it starts to dwindle in sound. You ever worked on one project particular for hours just because it didn't sit right for the _entire_ work? That's him right now.

It was too bad that Jay wasn't here, they haven't collaborated in several months, a year to be exact. They were basically the male Bonnie and Clyde, synergizing very well with one another since they both did the same music genres. _Now all I gotta do is synergize this damn kic-_

And his phone rang. If this was his tour manager calling _again_ , they're both gonna have to throw hands. He picked up the phone lazily and plopped it on his right ear.

"What?"

"Well damn, my fault for calling."

Almost instantly, Adrian lightened up at the sound of Irene's voice. His feet left the table and he leaned forward in the wheeled chair. "Bruh, I thought it was my tour manager for a second. The dude called me like eight times."

"You can just check the caller ID?"

Adrian paused. Then he took a deep breath. "...So, how are you today?"

He heard her mutter the word 'idiot' while chuckling. "I'm alright, I mean…" she paused, and Adrian frowned as though she were right in front of him. The two had a sibling-like relationship, automatically Adrian knew something was wrong.

"You mean…?"

She sighed. An obvious sign of her debating whether or not she wanted to tell him, of course. _What could be so hard to talk about…?_

"I have a visitor."

 _Okay… "_ Yeah?"

"A year long visitor."

"Wait, what the fuck? What-" he was confused as hell, what did she mean by that? "What person _visits_ a house for a year? That's a damn roommate, not a visitor."

She laughed on the other hand. "Well _yea_ umm… his name is Zamasu, right. And he's a little…" Adrian squinted and cocked his head forward. "You know what, let me start from the beginning. About a week ago, this dude named Gowasu came from outta nowhere, he's yellow, like actually yellow in skin, so I'm guessing he's from another species or something, I don't know. He tells me that there is this apprentice of his, really smart dude, named Zamasu, who has a bit of a problem with the human race, so Gowase decided randomly on making him stay with humans for an entire year, and he apparently picked me for it. After I returned home from our hangout, they were there, and it's been two days ever since. So… yeah."

Adrian sat there with the phone in his hand, blinking multiple times with his mouth slightly parted. Two seconds passed, then three, then four, and Adrian finally took a deep breath.

"Now I know you told me like a few months ago, that you were drug-free, Irene-"

"I'm not ly-I'm being deadass right now. This dude's name is Zamasu and he's umm… my housemate for a year. Yup…"

"So you expect me to believe," he was just about to start cracking up, "that a banana-looking ass guy who knows how to teleport into people's houses decided that you would be best to teach his green student _the ways of the humans_ and stuff?"

"Look it sounds crazy, I know, but I'm so serious right now!"

" _Ooookaaaaaaay."_ Adrian snickered, sarcasm pouring into his voice. Matter of fact, it was dumped into his voice.

"Aight bet, come over and I'll show you myself."

"I'm kinda busy with music and stuff though. And I also can't see what's in your head, you nut." He playfully jabbed at her and he could almost see the sour look on her face. "I might do so during the week though so you better be ready."

"No, _you_ better be ready."

"Okay, how about this;" _does staying on the phone talking about a salty green guy count as procrastinating?_ Adrian erased that thought from his mind, "Do you know what he's like at least? Since you're so apt into making me believe that yellow and green talking people exist."

"Well, like almost two days ago in the morning, he ignored me until I sat on my kitchen counter. Then he started saying that humans were all evil and all we do is fight and shit like that. He has a really passionate hate for humans, and he didn't even call me by my name, and he kept looking at me angrily. Not the nicest person, of course." He heard the sound of something dropping in the background, and a muttered curse from Irene. "I just dropped my brush."

"Well umm, that actually sounds quite believable." That was dangerously close to saying unbelievable. "So is that all you had to tell me?"

"Just to let you know, of course. I told Rebecca too."

"The _same exact thing_ you told me? Well shit."

Irene groaned in frustration. "Just _wait_ until you friggin' see, asshole!"

"Okay, okay. Calm down, Ms. Cleo." If she were in this room she would probably throw a trash bin at him. "I'd love to stay on the phone for hours but I ain't in high school anymore, bruh. I gotta work on this track." He looked back at the DAW on the screen, resisting a heavy sigh. "But best believe I'm gonna come over one of these days and see what you're talking about."

She sighed. "Alright then, peace."

"See you later." He made a mock kissing sound into the phone.

"I have a boyfriend, you know." Her voice sounded sarcastic.

"Dude if I wanted to date you I would've done that years ago."

She chuckled. "True, true. Okay, I'll see you later." And she hung up. Adrian placed his phone back on the desk, and snorted. Lowkey, he figured she wasn't actually lying, but what kind of person has a green roommate for an entire year? He really wanted to see it for himself at least, because he was certain that _green people do not exist_.

She left him alone for two days, just about the same amount of time that he spent procrastinating before being here. And to his dismay, those two days flew by far too quickly for his liking. Now, in the blight of evening, Irene had him sitting on her couch, and she was sitting on a couch adjacent to the one he was on. She clasped her hands together and looked at him, those large brown eyes made him twitch.

"I know we hadn't got off on the right foot, okay. But I don't know much about you, and I think it would be nice for us to _actually_ get to know each other. And I got a few questions…"

 _Oh, great._

"So… you're not human, I assume-"

"Of course I'm not."

Irene raised her hands up, as if gesturing him to 'chill out'. " _Okay,_ I get that. So then what are ya?"

"I am a Kaioshin, an apprentice of Gowasu."

"Ohhh," she nodded in understanding that he already knew she didn't have. "So… Do all you Kaioshin look like that? All of you are green and yellow, and have hair like that?"

He breathed. "...No, we're not all green and yellow. As for the hair, it's mutual among us." This was a pretty level-headed conversation, though Zamasu can't shake the feeling that she might say something stupid.

Irene crossed her legs, propping her elbows on her knees with a small cup in one of her hand. She took a spoonful from it and tilted her head. "That's some genetics… your parents have that hair too?"

"We don't… have parents." He realized just how baffling this might sound to her if she raised that question of how the Kaio come to be without reproduction.

"...The fuck- then how do you guys procreate?"

 _Watch your language, human_. He took a deep breath. "Kaioshin are born from apples of the Kaiju tree. We do not reproduce the way you humans do," _which you all need to stop doing that._ The look on her face crossed between shock, confusion and awe, but he continued, "which explains why there are so little of us, compared to the population of your species."

Irene blinked. "So there is like a thousand of you guys just chilling in another planet?"

"No. We live in an entirely different realm altogether, and there is at least 80 of us."

Now her eyes went wide. " _Eighty?_ Damn…" then her face changed into a weird look as she looked into her cup and back to him. "D...did you say that you were born from apples?"

 _Was she not listening or is she that daft?_ "Yes I did."

Irene looked at her cup, then back at him, then at her cup, and she got up and went into the kitchen. She came back several seconds later without the cup in her hand and sat down with a tiny, almost guilty raised a brow. "What was that for?"

Irene's eyes flickered to the ground, and she look at him apologetically. "I was… eating apple sauce."

Zamasu pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes, shaking his head.

"Wait, that actually makes sense! So did you come from a green apple?"

"That's not how it goes…"

"You know, because you're green and green apples are usually sour and shit like that?"

Zamasu raised his head. "No! I wasn't born from a green appl-Why say that it's sour?"

She narrowed her eyes and smirked in a way that made Zamasu want to kick her in the throat. "Why not?"

"That doesn't answer my question."

"People like you are sour, and green apples are sour."

That 'kick in the throat' idea didn't sound so bad right now. "I'm not sour, you cretin."

Irene tilted her head and made an 'are you serious face' while leaning forward. "What did you say, like _just_ now?"

Zamasu shook his head. "I'm speaking to you, and you irritate me."

"Bruh, I just wanted to get to know you. Why are you acting like I cussed you out?"

 _Just breathe._ "I don't like you humans."

"You say that every time we speak to each other."

"Is that not a reason to your question? _Do you want a demonstration_?"

 _Is this dude threatening me?_ Irene rolled her eyes. "No, I don't want a demonstration. Your teacher said that you can't hit me." Zamasu looked away from her, anger was written on his face. "Besides, I haven't done anything wrong have I? I came clean this _whole_ time." _And guess who hasn't…_

Zamasu stood up, and almost instantly Irene shot up and held his arm. "Nu-uhhh, you sit yo ass back do-"

"Don't **touch** me!" He ripped his hand away from her grasp so hard that she almost went with it. "You asked your questions, I have answered them. Now I may go."

"No you _may_ not." Irene crossed her arms. "Look, you're not gonna learn anything if you keep walking away from talking to me. Maybe I might change your perspective on humans if you just give it a chance."

Zamasu zeroed in on her, since he was taller he towered over her smaller frame. His grey eyes looked at her with a heat, intense gaze, so much so that Irene flinched at his look. His voice came out like acid. "Listen, don't you ever," he took one step closer, and Irene backed away, " _ever,_ think that you will be able to change what I think and what I _see_ of your species. This entire year, the next three hundred and _sixty two_ days being here will not even come close to swaying what I witnessed for thousands of years. So don't get your _hopes_ up." He quickly turned around and walked briskly away from Irene, who just stood there as he went upstairs.

This will not be the last time she's attempted to make him amicable. However, Zamasu didn't know that this small snippet of his life would no doubt be the _longest_ year of his long life. And he didn't know that he would soon stop saying or thinking every brash word he's called Irene in the past few days. And he didn't know who or what he was going to get into in the future, and he _definitely_ didn't _think_ that what he had said would soon be disproved.

But that look he gave her was no doubt going to return, and in the most ironic and unexpected way possible.

※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※

Night.

The perfect scenery was bestowed upon Irene's backyard; the sky was a dark blue hue that was almost black, the grass no longer had a highlight on its blades, fireflies were bringing small bits of light around the premise. The breeze was cool and calm, and the noise of crickets wasn't too loud; it gave way to the moon's bright appearance.

Too bad Irene was asleep so she couldn't see any of this.

But there was one person watching nature as it did its thing. Calmly and quietly, he was sitting on the cool grass looking at a book. Zamasu found refuge at night, because that was when she was asleep, or at least as far as he knew, and he could sit in pure peace. And this was exactly what peace was; sitting outside and reading a book to pass time.

It wasn't uncommon for Zamasu to do this; he was almost always either reading or observing surroundings around him when he isn't making Gowasu's tea. The Kaioshin live a life of studying, and their books served enough leisure to the green Shinjin. Luckily for him, he found a few books including the one he was currently reading about many different things on Desna, like the landscapes, the plants, so on and so forth. Gowasu told him that he had to be near this human or in her quarters at all times, he wanted him to observe what she did on a daily basis which kind of sucked because he didn't want to watch a human being _period_. Technically, being outside isn't too far from her, is it?

All he could 'observe' was how indignant she was, especially when she spoke to him. Not _once_ did she bow and almost all the time he'd catch her speaking with such foul language. Other than that, she was always in that 'mystery room', which really wasn't much a mystery because she told him she was an artist and that was reserved for her. Whenever she left that room, she'd have paint on her hands, on parts of her clothes, face and hair and a part of him questioned how she even managed to get them off with her quick five minute showers.

Speaking of showers, her time between them over the week was super sporadic. Sometimes she'd be in there for five or ten minutes, and sometimes for a good two hours. She'd come out, get dressed and if it were nighttime, cook something and always asked him if he wanted any, to which he always said a firm _No._ He would be lying if he said that the smell of her food didn't sometimes catch him glancing at the kitchen every now and then, but no, he didn't need to her food. Or _any_ human food in general.

It probably tasted disgusting anyway.

He'd also catch wind of her speaking, which he guessed that she was speaking to someone else through that small rectangle device that was in her hands on occasions. Some of the words she said he didn't even understand, and a lot of them were curse words, which obviously made him scowl at whatever direction she was in. Judging from the amount of times he'd hear her speaking, he would more than likely run into other people that were _probably just like her_.

 _It's best to keep my focus on this book instead of what I will be subjected to in the next several hours._

And that's exactly what he did. He sat outside as the moon let it's place in the sky and as the sun slowly rose in the dawn. He had finished a couple of books overnight, and by a couple meaning _several_ , so he figured it'd be best to walk back and return the book into her little abode, before she woke up and asked him any questions. Zamasu entered the house via the back kitchen door which led outside, and sat on the couch in Irene's living room. From what he could hear, she just woke up and is in her bathroom getting ready for the day, _and getting ready to anger me even further_. He looked at a small display screen on the counter the divided the kitchen and living room, it read 11:15 am. In a good few minutes Irene's footsteps sounded down the stairs as well as her audible yawn.

Irene stretched once both her feet hit the carpet floor of her living room. Brown eyes looked around the room and then at Zamasu, and she instantly smiled brightly. "Good morning."

 _Oh, great_. He didn't answer, he just turned back around and crossed his arms. Irene went to sit right by him. "Hey, dudeguy. Did ya sleep well last night?" Now she didn't know if he actually did sleep but she just assumed that he slept later than her and woke up earlier than she did. Zamasu looked at her, then looked back down at the ground, lips slightly pursed.

"I don't need sleep."

"Hmm, so then what'd you do while I was asleep?"

 _What else could I possibly do_? Zamasu decided to answer her plainly. "I read."

Irene raised an eyebrow. "Read? Read wha- Ohhh, you took some books from my shelf right?"

He gave her a look. Irene raised her hands. "I haven't touched those things in months, years probably; I even forgot they existed tho'."

"Hmmph."

She sighed. "Alright, Zamasu, look 'ere. I know you don't like humans, but can you at least _pretend_ ," she raise her hands and made a tiny gesture, "That you are trying to get something out of this?"

Zamasu leaned back, the Kaioshin narrowed his eyes at her. "Why does it matter to the likes of you?"

"Well I mean, I wouldn't want an all-around pissed off guy in my house for an entire year, my dude." _And it's slowly getting more and more entertaining to irritate you._ "Besides, I haven't done anything wrong to ya. You shouldn't even be this upset if this is your first time talking to one of _us_ , you know."

Zamasu blinked, and then scoffed. "You simply do not understand how dangerous your kind is. You all kill each other and set your entire race back repeatedly."

Now it was Irene's turn to blink, and a few times at that. "Umm… look I don't think I've got into a fight in the past few years so…" she scratched the back of her head.

"Such behavior is transgressed every single day for thousands of years."

 _Using big ass words and shit…_ "Okay umm… I'm not even fifty yet. So why are you taking all of that and putting it on me?" She was genuinely confused, it didn't make sense to her at all. "I haven't slapped you or drop kicked you or nothing, so if I'm not violent as you said, don't ya think it would make sense to _not_ treat me as though I am?"

Zamasu had his eyes closed the whole time and his face morphed from indifferent to a full on grimace. He stood up from his seat and made his way upstairs, Irene once again left to ponder and whatnot. He didn't feel the need to answer her question because he felt that he already stated why she was deemed the way she was. He hated her, and that's all that he knows now. And that's what he was certain was what he would feel through this entire 'experience', but a whole ton of things can happen in the span of three hundred and sixty one days.

And this was _just_ the beginning.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **IT HAS BEEN UPDATED!**

 **I do wanna say Ima try not to end up doing something like this, because I dunno if would show an updated fanfic lest it had another chapter added to it. But with that being said, Hope you enjoyed this chapter!**


	4. A Visitor Or Two

**HAPPY FRIGGIN THANKSGIVING Y'ALL!**

 **I do want to apologize for the long wait, there are things happening outside of the Internet. I had midterms (yes, midterms in November) so I couldn't get to this as soon as possible. On the flip side though, this chapter is long af, so prepare your eyeballs. It's also Thanksgiving, so matter fact prepare your eyeballs and your stomachs. Anyways, let's dropkick into the story…**

 **Well not really** _ **dropkick**_ **, I don't want y'all dropkicking your screens. That would be kinda painful.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **A Visitor… Or Two**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 _ **Ring ring riggity ring ring.**_

 _And there goes my phone._

If only she wasn't so immersed into her painting, Irene wouldn't have jumped so hard at the innocuous sound of her ringtone. Now there is a stupid line in the middle of a mountainous terrain. _I mean, it won't be hard to fix, though_. She looked down at her phone and would have debated on picking it up until her eyes were on the caller ID.

 _ **Da Kidd**_

Don't ask why she even came up with that, it's an inside joke.

Irene answered the call. "Jay, what's good?"

"Wassup."

"Nothing much. So what brings you to call me?"

She heard a distorted sound in the background which she guessed was a part of one of his tracks. "I thought of coming over, y'know, but I didn't want to be rude and show up uninvited or anything."

If you knew Jay, you would know that he had a reputation for saying things in such a terrifically sarcastic manner that you'd almost think he was serious. Once he became comfortable with you, you better _expect_ him to randomly come by your crib at any time, so him asking her this was just another way to make her straight face at his random politeness.

It worked though. "Really- Bruh I know you long enough to know that you would come even if I said no." He is a gentleman, there is no doubt about that. Seriously. "Aren't you busy tho'?"

There was a pause on the other end, then she heard the click of a mouse. "You see, I would say I'm busy, but I can't be busy when it comes to music, fam."

"That doesn't exactly answer my question, nugget." Nugget was his nickname more or less one of his PSN account names. You know, for comedic purposes.

"Bruh didn't I just say I was _finishing_? I have enough time in the world to visit yo' ass."

She laughed. "Look, you and Adrian take a good two hours to just _finish_ a track."

Just from the way he paused she can tell he was raising his finger up in a matter-of-fact gesture. "...well you're right, I can't even front on that." There was shuffling on his end of the call. "I can't _not_ be a perfectionist okay, I'm Asian as fuck."

Irene couldn't help the snort that just came out of her from that. "A'ight then."

"Adrian might be coming too."

The two were almost inseparable. She wouldn't be surprised if they were long-lost brothers. "You just wanna kick, bruh? By the time you come over Ima be done with this painting."

"Oh, aight. Yo, I got a question?"

"What?"

"Adrian told me somethin-" Instantly Irene thought about the conversation she and Adrian had about a week ago. And judging from his reaction he didn't believe her shit. But then again, who would ride with the fact that some sour green apple 'all-human' hating ass white haired god was in her home? _I'm pretty sure he said I was friggin crazy, God s-_ "Irene?"

"W-what?"

"... Were you listening?"

"Oh I was umm… reading something."

He kissed his teeth. " _Sure shit_. Now, as I was saying, Adrian told me that your boyfriend's arm is fine now. Remember how dude sprained it last month or some shit?"

 _Thank God._ Irene narrowed her eyes. "Fam, you do realize I have my bae's number too, right? I already know that."

"Yeah, Rebecca treated him."

"...Is this leading to another one of y'alls conspiracies?"

Irene rolled her eyes. It wasn't like they were trying to egg their friendship, over the years Adrian slowly stopped talking or trying to keep in contact with Rebecca. Anytime Irene would ask why was because he wasn't that cool with her and would justify their lack of communication by not having a phone, so literally the only time they would talk was in their hangouts. Jay wasn't as stoic to her as Adrian, and that was more than likely due to his nature, but she could tell they both shared the same sentiment. Why they did was pretty unknown to her.

"Not really, I am just saying."

 _Sure_. She was quick to dismiss anything like this because Rebecca was indeed her best friend. Most of their answers were always riddled anyway. "Well okay then. I think I need to go and finish this piece. Ima see you later."

"Yep, see you guys later." And he hung up, right before Irene could ask him a question about that statement. _The heck did he mean by 'you guys'?_ Maybe it was her being unreasonably skeptical or something, but why would Jay say 'you guys' if she lived alone _according to him_? _Maybe they're coming separately, w_ hich she honestly hoped for, because truth be told she was kind of wary about how Zamasu would react. _This dude hates the shit out of humans apparently, how is he gonna act when there's the three of us in here?_ Besides, she and her bros weren't anything close to diplomatic when they're together and Zamasu was just deeming her disrespectful for it several days ago.

You know what, it's not like she'll tone it down just for him anyway. And like she said before, _he will have to deal with it._

The human seemed to be in her secret room of some sort, Zamasu was left alone to his own devices, which he was thankful for. The Kaioshin was now sitting on the bed in his temporary room, hands running against the soft fabric of the blanket. Mindful of his quiet surroundings, he already looked around the room that he was given. The walls were a light beige color ( _is everything pale in this woman's house_ ), the carpet was the same soft toe-curlable material as the hallway but it was a persimmon hue and the bed was white as well as the blanket. There was a small desk next to his bed, with that weird little screen displaying four numbers with a colon in the middle. There was another drawer that was much bigger on the other side of room, and there was a window on the opposite wall of that drawer which allowed for sunlight to hit the bed on a cloudless day.

His fingers kept tracing the small designs on his bed, and his thoughts took on a route that he barely ever accessed before. This entire room was both bigger and _better_ than what he was allotted to in his realm; that other room wasn't big enough to fit a large drawer _and_ still have enough space for him to lay on the floor like this one. As well as the bed, it was soft and cushioned, he could lay on it and feel it comply with his frame, but at home it was nothing like this. He only had a mat on the floor which Gowasu told him was 'better suited for his back.' Zamasu wasn't one to compare things of his to anything else but what else could he do now other than think?

He stopped tracing the patterns. In fact, he got up from the bed and went to the door without a word, and definitely without any lingering thought that he spared in that room. He started towards the stairs and then stopped.

 _Why am I going down there_? If he went there he would be faced with that woman again, and she would open her wretched mouth and say something that he didn't like. But for some reason, he didn't want to stay in his room anymore. He figured that it was because of boredom, staying in one place wasn't exactly _entertaining_. His steps were quiet, slow, hoping that she wasn't sitting in her living room or doing something in her kitchen. With his final step down the stairs, he looked around the silent living room, then he leaned over to see the kitchen. _Empty_ , the coast was clear. He took a seat on one of her couches and decided to ponder something that he thought about repeatedly over the course of the week.

What in the realms was he supposed to get from this, other than anger, irritation and stress? How did Gowasu think this was going to be a _good_ idea, pinning him in a place that he didn't know, or _didn't want to know_ , for a entire year? Another side Zamasu told him that it was nothing to worry about; it's for a mere year and he has been alive for _millions_ , this would feel like a simple second passing by. It's only just one year… _It won't be that long, it's only three hundred sixty five days…_

 _Fifty two weeks…_

 _A waste of five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes…_

Yep, he couldn't convince himself anymore.

If he couldn't get through the week without wanting to punch a human in the face, which hopefully he'll get the chance to do one d-

A door knob was turning. Zamasu looked over to the damned green door, watching as it creaked open slowly. _Is this another way the gods are testing me?_ Irene stepped forward, there were paint marks on her arms and hair, but she didn't seem to mind. She stretched and nodded towards him as a greeting.

"'Sup."

Zamasu's eye twitched. "My name is Zamasu."

Irene paused, and looked at him. Was there something she wasn't getting. "What are you talking about."

"My name is Zamasu, not 'sup'."

Irene started to laugh. "No, n- I said 'sup', as in what's up." She started towards the kitchen. "You need to step your hip game up, my boy."

"I don't need to be _'hip'_ with you humans."

"Look if you're gonna spend a year here, you gotta learn something at least. We're not always going to speak like we're in universities or something." Irene pulled out a water bottle, opening it while walking towards him. " _Lighten up, Zamasu._ "

He just make a low growling noise and looked at her scornfully.

She raised her hands, and backed away from him. "...just saying."

Does she not get that he hates her with a passion? Why is she acting like he was just some random person, had she no respect for the gods themselves? Or is she that ignorant? "I'm not here to make friends."

"Never said you were. And you don't have to." She turned around from her kitchen counter, glaring at him. "But if you want to spend all this time _not_ sulking about living with a bunch of humans, then at least pretend that you are interested."

"Who are you to tell a _god_ what to do?"

"Bruh, I'm not telling you what to do. I'm just… giving advice." She gestured towards him with her smart little reply. Zamasu sat back, looking away from her and crossing his arms. Meanwhile, Irene was fishing out a chocolate bar from the cabinet. She closed the cabinet, and made her way to the living room couches, much to Zamasu's dismay.

Irene sat down and looked at him, he still had that angry look on his face. _Sour green apple looking ass…_ "Hey." No answer. "Look, if I angered you in any way then I'm sorry, but I wasn't trying to be mean or disrespectful."

Zamasu looked at her, we'll actually he _glared_ at her, and then uncrossed his arms. Irene continued. "And also I'm having visitors here in the evening or something."

No, no he did not hear that. Hopefully his more than excellent Kaioshin hearing didn't actually pick up that there would be _more humans_ _in this house?_ She was already one problem, now he had to deal with another.

"There my friends, Adrian and Jay-"

 _There's two more of them._ Gods, help him.

"Just letting you know. I'm sure they won't be here for long though." She raised her finger. " _Don't_ throw a damn fit over them either. Like please, be nice."

Is he a damn child she's talking to? "I know how to act, _woman_. _You_ , on the other hand…"

Irene took a deep breath. "We're not gonna get into this again. There are people coming and I don't want you staring them down like you do to me." She stood up, "Besides, they're my _friends_. It ain't no damn business meeting, we come through to have fun." Irene walked away with the bottle in her hand back into the kitchen. Zamasu just looked at her, _appalled_ , and more than likely wanting to knock some sense into her. However, Zamasu was diplomatic; he wouldn't strike first and unreasonably, he will have to wait until she provokes him to actually do so.

Which would never happen.

"You're probably just hungry, fam." She leaned backwards looking at him. "You want some chocolate?"

It took him a couple seconds later, because he was disrespected, irritated, and trying to breathe his way to relaxing. "I don't know what that is."

Irene straight-faced, _Ima give this dude a nickname later._ Why can't he just answer her question without sounding stank as fuck? "Chocolate… it's like candy, and it tastes really really good." She closed the cabinet and went to him with a fresh bar of chocolate. She held it out, but Zamasu didn't take it, he instead gave her a look.

She shook it gently. "C'mon Zamasu… it's from _Belgiuuuuuum_ …"

He squinted. "You didn't put any poison in this." He could tell that from her, and after he spoke her eyes widened.

"Dude, why would I poison you? Aren't you a god? Shouldn't you be _immune_ to that shit?"

" _Watch your language._ "

"Okaaaaaay, I'll try harder next time." No, she won't. "Take it. You're missing out on an opportunity here, mister."

He took the bar with the same annoyed face he adorned for the past week and looked at it, turning it around, inspecting it fully. Of course there was a wrapping around it, that he figured, so he opened it slowly. Meanwhile, Irene found her seat on the couch and watched him unveil this so-called 'delicious' treat. He unwrapped the top and found nothing more than a brown rectangle bar underneath. Blinking multiple times he looked at her again and she nearly flailed her arms.

"For fucks sake, just _eat it_ , damn!"

Again with the language, does this woman not learn?

He took a small bite from the bar's corner, and chewed slowly. Gradually his eyes widened and blinked, straightening his posture as the sweet, savory taste went through his mouth. He looked at it, and took another bite, almost forgetting that she was sitting right there watching his reaction.

Instantly, he retained a poker face as he chewed and swallowed his second bite. He looked at her and gave her the most _honest_ - _to-everything_ response ever mustered.

"It is… interesting."

She kissed her teeth. "You know _damn well_ that tastes good as hell, I know you do."

"I didn't say it was bad."

"Your whole expression was much more for just an 'it was interesting'." She went back to the cabinet. "It's a good thing I gave you that today. I would've finished all of them beforehand." Irene took another chocolate bar out even though she knew that her supply of those goodies were running out. There were only like eight left.

She returned to the living room and stopped when she noticed the wrapper was on the table, but the chocolate bar was nowhere to be seen. Zamasu looked up at her and frowned.

"What?"

"Bruh, did you seriously finish that whole bar while I was in the damn _kitchen_?"

Zamasu raised an eyebrow. "...Yes?"

"The bars are deadass King-sized. It was that good?"

Zamasu blinked, looked down at the wrapper, and back at her. "I didn't want to waste food."

She kissed her teeth extra loud this time. "You _know_ that shit was good. Stop lyin'."

"Don't ever tell a Kaio to stop lying."

"Okay then, grandma, stop telling a story." She exaggerated her gestures and made Zamasu's eye twitch, which honestly isn't even a difficult feat. _Because dude gets uptight at everything_. "Ima go and take a shower, get all this paint off'a'me, y'know?"

She didn't wait for an answer, because Zamasu didn't want to answer her, and left him alone once again. Zamasu's tongue roamed around inside his mouth, getting a sliver of taste from the chocolate he just ate. His eyes were on the wrapper and they wandered to the couch, the walls, and finally back down on the ground.

He was angry again.

No, angry is too strong of a word to describe. He knew exactly what he felt from the minute he took observation of his room, but he didn't want say anything at all; he didn't want to _think_ of such a thing because as a Kaioshin it would seem obsolete to even feel remotely close to what he felt. Grey eyes seethed with an emotion that was rare to him, for that chocolate bar was actually better than he expected.

Actually, _way_ better than he expected. _Too good to even be true._

That was the most he's ate in thousands of years, and it actually didn't taste _bland_. In his long years of living in the Kai realm, he didn't even have access to food that wasn't boring in taste, in fact he didn't even have free access to a wide variety of food in the first place. Gowasu would give him the same thing, sometimes he'd variate it but that was just about it, and then Zamasu would have to wait a long time until he'd be able to eat that _same thing_ again. He wasn't even able to make his own _tea_ sometimes. And this human woman had such an exceptionable treat just sitting in her home. _Her_ own home.

Zamasu's fist clenched for almost ten seconds, then they unclenched. _Wait, what am I even getting-_ What was he getting upset at? Did this bar have some adverse effects on him or something?

What a stupid thought.

He stood up again. He found himself doing that a lot, every time something irritating pops up in his mind he just gets up and walks away as though the damned thought didn't have the ability to follow him wherever he went. Well it sure did, because even him leaving his room didn't help that feeling in his gut that was slowly, _very torturously slowly_ growing. It didn't help that she had to show up while he was sitting alone in peace, and apparently this was the most amount of peace he'll be getting because her little comrades were coming over to visit her, _and also to test my patience_.

He looked towards the kitchen's farthest wall, which had a window on it. The sun was still up and high, so he guessed it was still morning. He had more than enough to seat and gather his tolerance for, her words, 'the evening or something'; the evening was about a few hours away, that's more than enough time.

 _ **Ding ding.**_

He could've sworn he was sitting for thirty minutes. But apparently that's not the case, because the sun had already set, much to his ever growing dismay.

 _ **Ding ding.**_

Why did time all of the sudden decide to speed it's way towards this moment? And why is he still sitting the living room? That literally give him less time to take a few deep breaths in order to keep him from-

"Zamasu! Can you please open the doo-"

 _Is she serious? Is this happening right now?_

"You know what, lemme get it." Irene did this half-walk-half-jog thing down the steps and towards the door. Meanwhile, Zamasu stood up from the couch and quick-walked his way into the kitchen, because no he didn't want to meet these people. He heard the door open and the sound of a few voices speaking at once.

"Bruuuh, it's been so damn long! How you been?"

That was male voice, and he speaks like her. _Ugh…_

"Jay!" Irene laughed and ruffled his messy bunned hair, to which Jay reached up and ruffled her big kinky hair. She felt someone poke at her sides making her giggle.

"Guess who it ihhh'..."

Irene turned to see her brother from another mother; Adrian. "Boy…" She faced him fully, now giving them both a huge hug. "I swear the next time you tickle me, I'll deck you."

"Oooh, Adri, watch the fuck out." Jay backed up and held his hands up in the air. Jay had a way of saying things in a comedic way, even if it wasn't meant to be funny. "So, you know why we're here right?"

"...other than to kick it, what other reason do you possibly have?" She raised an eyebrow. Jay looked at Adrian, Adrian looked at Jay, they both had this smile on their face and from that Irene knew that they came here to see something. Jay spoke up with a grin.

"Is there a green Martian in your house?"

"Fucking knew it…" Irene glared at Adrian, who had this look called 'i-know-I'm-not-innocent-but-Ima-pretend-because-I-want-to' look on his face. "...yes?"

"You guys think I am joking huh? This _green ass Martian_ is just hiding in the damn kitchen!"

You know when visitors come to your house and you try to hide in some secret place just so you don't see them? Well meanwhile, Zamasu's head slowly went up when Irene said something about the kitchen, which no doubt meant that she wanted him to see these members of her idiot species.

"Zamasuuuuuu!"

This _wench_ had the nerve to drag his name in some sort of sing-song voice. Zamasu stood there, looking more than reluctant. _Is there such thing as an unlucky God?_

"Come ou- oh, for fuck's sake." She stomped in and grabbed him by the wrist, Zamasu instantly recoiled.

"Don't not put your hands on me, human!"

"Oh shit, there _is_ someone in there." Jay tilted over out of curiosity. Jay could only see Irene pulling at something.

"Deadass, watch it be James, I'm calling it." Adrian crossed his arms and walked over. "James, get the fuc-"

The prestigious music producer stopped in his tracks when he saw the full scope of the entire kitchen; here was Irene, pulling at this green dude's arm like it was a tug of war match, and he was giving her the angriest look that Adrian has ever seen. They both stopped and turned to him, he blinked twice and then pointed between the two. "You weren't lying…" A pause, and then finally Adrian raised his arms all confused and whatnot. "What type of fuckshit? How did you even get a Martian in here?"

"He's not a Martian… I think."

Jay walked in and had the same exact reaction that Adrian had only with a little twist. "Bruuuh, I never knew green people exist! Lemme guess, you're vegan right?"

Adrian straightfaced. "Dude, you are such a dumbass."

"He's green, _right_? And he-" Jay stopped to look at his head. "My guy got a mohawk too?"

"He's wearing some shiny ass boots tho'."

"Facts, yo what kinda pants are those?"

Irene stood straight, and interrupted the both of them and almost interrupted Zamasu from scowling at them. "You guys meet Zamasu and the first thing you ask is what kinda pants he's wearing? How about a hello?"

"Oh yeah. Sup." Jay nodded towards him and Zamasu glared hard at the Asian adult male who looked back at him with a raised brow. "You just gon' stare at me like that? I heard you speaking English like not even ten minutes ago." He took a few steps towards the Kaioshin, who looked a bit shocked. "I know _damn well_ you can understand me."

Zamasu on the other hand was just about ready to kill this disrespectful human being. _He's even worse than her! How is this possible?_ "I can understand you. However, you should be speaking so brazenly to a apprenticed God!"

"My dude…" Jay puts his hands up in Roast Formation. "I can _see_ you. Aren't you supposed to be up there?"

"Jay, I think you should stop, he looks like he's gonna rank at any minute." Adrian placed his hand on Jay's shoulder; even with the smile on his face, he and Irene knew that Jay was very stoic to people he didn't know at first. Even green people too.

"This is what I didn't want to go down." Irene muttered. "Zamasu, these are my friends Adrian and Jay." She gestured to the guys even though this first impression was already ruined, but hey, why not again? "And umm…"

"I do not care about your human friends." Zamasu flatly spoke, he look at all of them, giving Jay a hard glare.

"Well, you're _gonna_ start caring about them whether you like it or not, you nut." Hands on her hips, Irene stood her ground, even with Zamasu's universe-famous death glare.

Adrian scratched his head. "Aside from the first date Jay had with his girlfriend, this is probably one of the worst first impressions ever, just because this guy seems to not know how we roll and shit."

Jay's face whipped towards him. "Dude, shut the fuck up."

"It's _true_."

"No it's not."

"Yes it is."

"No it wasn't."

"You nearly burned her kitchen down."

"Bruh it wasn't _that_ bad!"

" _Boy."_ Adrian's hands were in Roast Formation. "You tried to blow out all the fire with her fucking _coat_."

Jay opened his mouth but then paused for like three seconds. "Okay look, low-key that was the closest thing I _had_."

" _When the hell did this happen? The fuck?_ " Irene's eyes switched from the guys in confusion.

"Remember the first time he took her to his crib? He tried to cook for her."

"Oh for fucks sake…"

"Key fucking word; _tried._ "

"Look, that was like a year and a half. I can cook now!"

"You can't even make minute Mac n' Cheese."

"Bruh, do you want me to whip out the pans now-"

"ENOUGH!"

The three humans looked at the one green Kaioshin who just about looked like he was done with their shit. And he was; how the hell could humans just divert from his presence like that? Are they really that arrogant? And why do they feel the need to be so vulgar around them? He inhaled slowly, and spoke with a strained tone. "I have no business in whatever affairs you had before, nor do I want any in the first place. Now if you three _idiots_ would excuse me, so that I can leave and be alone."

Irene literally stepped forward loudly and she pointed at him. "Your teacher said that you needed to learn about humans, so you're gonna spend time with us. Do you not want to disappoint that yellow dude?"

"They can be yellow? The fuck, are y'all some sort of rainbow species or some shit?" Jay raised his hand at Zamasu. "And is that why you're here?"

Irene was the first to speak, because anyone knows Zamasu wouldn't answer you unless if you badgered him. "His teacher guy came through and said he'd randomly pick someone so that _this motherfucker right here_ ," she pointed at the fuming green Kaioshin, "can learn how humans act and behave, since he thinks we're all shitty and no-good or whatever."

Adrian looked between them. "Okay, no lie, a lot of people are shitty though. Just… throwing that out there."

"No, no, I mean he thinks we all kill each other and something about us being arrogant or something like that…" To be honest, a lot of what he said were like generalizations. The reason why she isn't so upset about what he says is simply because she already knew that he was just… uneducated on humans. The amount of fun she'll have with this guy, knowing damn well that she could've ignored him for an entire year. Unlike her, however, the looks on the guys' faces said showed they didn't reach the same conclusion as she did, and if they did, this year would probably be a lot less awkward for all of them. "Ugh, I'll give y'all deets later, okay. We can sit in the living room and I'll bring the snacks."

'Deets' was another way of them talking about classified things, things that shouldn't be spoken out loud when strangers are around. And in this case, what she thought would most likely get Zamasu's panties in a bunch.

... _Do they wear panties?_

"Bruh, if that's the case then I'ma be in the living room." Jay pulled strands of his messy-bunned hair out of his face and did a lazy walk to where her TV was.

"Aight. Now Zamasu," she turned to the green dude, angry again, and spoke. "I know you hate the shit out of humans and all, but can't you just _try_ to learn something?" _And also, stop looking at us like that_. "Don't give me that look."

Zamasu's sour face made him look like the Grinch's third cousin. "You don't any power to drag me along in your activities."

"Bo- I'm not trying to overpower you or whatever the fuck. I'm just saying to _relax_ … damn." She gestured for him to follow through, and Zamasu with much chagrin found himself sitting in her living room amongst her friends.

The last hour went by fast, but Zamasu found himself looking up at them for the certain things that they say. They would go from one topic to another, and then they'd be laughing the whole entire time. It was mostly the Asian male, Jay was his name, making the other two laugh, and sometimes his sidekick would join in and Irene would be clutching her stomach. Zamasu was just there, observing their laughing, their smiles, they're conversations, and their behavior, like a god would but 'up close'. And the whole time, that feeling in his gut was rising again, so Zamasu didn't heed the happy smiles and the good vibes between them, he instead was appalled by their free use of vulgar language.

Remember when he had that sour look on his face? Well, that was an hour ago. It still hasn't changed that much.

"So where're you from?"

He was pulled out of his thoughts when he realized the room went silent and that they were looking at him. Zamasu looked at the person who spoke, which was Adrian, and then to the other two in the room. Now here is the problem with this situation; he knew how Irene reacted when he told her his origins, now imagine the ridiculous things _they_ might say? He might just pop a blood vessel. He took a deep breath, which was what he's been doing _so many damn times_ over the course of a week. "I am a Kaioshin. I live in a separate realm, completely different from your world."

Their shocked expressions, minus Irene's, were expected. Jay's lips were parted and he was going to say something, but Adrian beat him to it. "Bruh you can travel through different _dimensions_ , my dude? That's lit!"

If Zamasu wanted to, if he really really wanted to, he would have chuckled at their curiosity, he would've smirked at Adrian's remark. But at this time, in only one week of being around humans constantly he couldn't see a reason to laugh, for that same curiosity was portrayed to him as ignorance. He just blinked, obviously confused at the last word that he used and why he would describe him living in realms as something synonymous with burning candles. "Well, yes. Kaioshin are _not humans_ , for the record. We are a different species altogether." He saw Irene's face, he clearly made that distinction for two reasons: humans are gross, and he didn't want them to treat him the same way that they treat each other. He is an apprenticed God for crying out loud, or for crying silently. Whichever is more tolerable.

Then Zamasu heard probably one of the many legendary quotes that he didn't understand within the first two months of being around Irene and her friends:

"Bruh, I never knew Power Rangers could use portals and shit."

Adrian snorted so loud that it made Irene laugh even harder than what Jay said. All of them were rolling on the couch laughing their faces off, Jay nearly laid on his bag, and Irene was clutching onto Adrian's shirt.

"...What's so funny?"

Meanwhile, Zamasu sat there looking as confused as a dog watching two giant cats break dancing at a bus stop. Because it didn't make sense to him as to why they were laughing, at all.

He waited for them to gather themselves together because he's a patient person. Luckily for him it didn't take long for them to recover, and he had to repeat himself. "What is so funny?"

Irene leaned forward with that big stupid smile on her face that he initially hated seeing. "Oh you don't know what a Power Ranger is, I forgot. Okay so to make it simple, Jay is kinda referring to umm…"

The answer to Irene's response was clarified by Jay's next question. "Is this what y'all Kaioshin dudeguys wear?"

 _The heck is a 'dudeguy'?_ Do they just come up with words on the spot like that? "This is our formal garb, yes."

"But dude," Adrian pulled his sleeves up to scratch his upper arm. "It's hot as hell outside. You're wearing a sweater, some baggy pants, and...that thingy all in 93 degree heat, fam? How are you not dying?"

"Deadass, I was sweating even _with_ the air conditioner on in my car." Jay leaned back, pulling his nonexistent sleeves upward.

"Bruh your AC doesn't even work properly."

"Boy, if I can turn that shit on then the shit works."

"It barely even cools jack shit! It's like a fat dude blowing in your face."

"He's not even lying though Jay, fix your shit." Irene turned towards the conversation that was soon arising, and everything in Zamasu was starting to boil again. How do they dismiss him so easily? Shouldn't they be keeping their ears open to a god? _Wait, why am I getting upset at this?_ At the lack of attention? Isn't that what he wanted? No, he did want them to leave him alone, but at least show some tidbit of respect while he is around, but judging from their idiotic behavior, they simply can't do that.

Zamasu didn't think of how contradicting that sounded, because he quickly usurped his train of thought by yelling "SILENCE!", which made all three of them turn to him. He inhaled. "If you three are going to venture into your own silly little conversations, then I should make my way back _upstairs_." He gave Irene the best glare that he could because she dragged him into this.

She obviously had no fear of him because she just smiled again. "Look, we're sorry, okay? We will allow you to tell us more about yourself without any interruption whatsoever."

Her sarcastic tone made him want to kick her in the throat, but she continued. "Wait, tell them about the magical apples and shit that you come from!"

"Wait, what?"

"Apples?" Adrian raised his brow, and looked at Zamasu.

The Kaioshin looked at all of them. "Kais do not reproduce, rather we are born for apples of the Kaiju tree."

"He's a green apple, you guys."

And she had to open her mouth and misconstrue everything.

"Oh word? You came from a green apple?"

"I mean that would make sense though. Dude is this healthy ass green color." Jay nodded as though this was an entirely level and intelligent conversation between the four. "OOOOH, hol'up! Wait a minute, wait…" Jay reached into his plastic bag and pulled out a small black container with these weird looking circles in it that looked edible, and opened it, grabbing a small little green ball with the wooden chopsticks that came with the box. He held it up and looked between the little ball and Zamasu, and automatically both Adrian and Irene started laughing.

Is there some sort of telepathy between these people? Because he didn't understand why Jay decided to show him a small green ba-

"Can I call you Wasabi?"

Zamasu pinched the bridge of his nose and exhaled. This conversation is going nowhere. " _No you cannot._ "

"Aww, lighten up Zamasu. We're just playing around fam. Geez…" Irene reached up to shake his shoulder and he swatted her hand away.

"Do I look like I want to play with you three idiots?!"

Just to be complete jerks, they all said "Yes" with a smug grin on their faces. _Is it okay if I can go this year with killing some of them?_

Zamasu stood up and started walking. "I'm done here. Continue your little hangout, keep me out of it."

Irene stood too, and she reached out to him. "Zamas-"

" _Keep. Me. Out. Of. It._ " He didn't leave any room for rebuttal, he left before Irene could even try to get him to sit back down. The three were left silence until they heard his last step on the stairs.

"So what's his problem?" Jay raised the question that, to be honest, all of them were asking silently. Irene looked at him.

"Zamasu doesn't like humans. But you know someone talks shit about something they don't know? Yup, that's him." She raised her hands. "I don't want y'all to act stank around him though. He's gonna learn to deal with us whether he likes it or not."

"Wow, you're just gonna put dude under house arrest or some shit?" Jay took a sushi roll out of his bento box.

"What other place _can_ he go? He didn't even what chocolate was, I highly doubt he can walk around in the streets without insulting somebody." Irene reached over to grab a roll, all the while Jay giving her a cross look. "Besides, it's been a week. My guy will start to like us within like a few months, I bet."

Adrian smirked. "You do realize that there are probably gonna be more people too right? Like your boyfriend, and that other girl."

"Rebecca? Adrian you _know_ her, for fucks sake."

"No I don't." He did, like a lot. A long time ago, he and Rebecca were dating for almost a year and a half in high school. But he broke up with her, which was weird to Irene because Rebecca was a nice girl. Literally, the two worked better than any couple she's ever seen. Well, besides his current girlfriend of course, but he still hasn't given Irene a reason why they broke up other than 'they lost feelings for each other'.

"Adrian is over like 'I don't recall'. He and I don't really like her, If you can tell Irene."

"I know, but why?"

Jay looked at Adrian, because he knew that Jay himself could be a little too blunt when it came to a lot of things. He knew that Rebecca and Irene had practically grew up together, they were like sisters and he didn't want to be a umm… _friend-wrecker_. He tries not to be as blunt as he usually is when the going gets serious. "We just think that she's a little… like, there is a left side to the bitch you know what I mean?"

 _Sometimes_ he tries.

"She's not a bitch. Can we not talk about this now before we get into a fight again?" Truth be told, both her and Jay fought over how supposedly 'fake' Rebecca was, and it was almost a physical fight, Adrian had to come between them to break them apart. And no, Jay wasn't a woman beater at all, but when it came to violence, if a woman hits him, none of those 'equal rights' ideals go out the window.

"Fine, fine. I'll quit it." He leaned back.

"You guys wanna play games?"

Irene snorted at how random Adrian's question was. Great way to break the tension between the two, they needed it. "Alright then. Can we play umm…"

"Mario Kart. The Wii is right there." Jay pointed below the mounted flat-screen TV, on the stand there was a Wii, a PS4 that both Adrian and Jay gifted to her, and a DVD player than she barely uses.

She stood up and cracked her knuckles. "You can't touch me in this game. Do you want to get bested again?"

"Bruh I whoop your ass in Mario Kart. Get the fuck outta here with that shit." Jay caught the remote that she tossed to him.

"Yeah but who's the one who got first place in 200cc, huh?"

"I _let_ you win that one okay." Jay pointed at her.

"I think you guys are completely forgetting that _the OG_ is sitting amongst you two." Adrian kicked back and leaned comfortably in the couch like he was a king. Irene tossed the remote a little too hard (on purpose) and it hit his crotch, making him groan and muttering 'asshole' under his breath.

"Aight then, it's game! Get your asses ready." Irene plopped back down on her seat.

"Finna get yo ass beat."

"Jay we'll see about that."

It's little things like this that made her love the two of them more than anything, like they were part of her family. The amount of lit-ass memories they had together were countless, even during her college years. She was more than happy to have them in her life. Her thoughts wandered over to the salty green guy that was probably pouting upstairs and realized that Zamasu hadn't smiled once since he came. He was always grumpy, upset, and just plain hateful. Did he even have people like Jay and Adrian? Did he even have anyone other than his teacher?

Her best guess was no. He simply just didn't have that kind of companionship other than with an elder or something. Maybe that's why he is always so stank, because he didn't have close friends. _That's kinda sad if you think about it, damn_.

It would be reaching to say that he's probably be lowkey jealous if her guess was correct. But then again, he thinks of himself too damn highly to even be jealous. There was no way that could happen, right?

 **Wrong.**

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 **No I didn't just meme the end of the story on purpose.**

 **This was a long one compared to the last three, but hopefully nothing will get in the way of me uploading a bit sooner next time.**

 **Zamasu has finally meet Adrian and Jay, and things will get spicier later on into the story. Eat to your heart's content, if you're celebrating Thanksgiving today (okay deadass don't eat too much because one time I did that and my stomach was doing Wushu lotus kicks afterwards and I couldn't do shit for like thirty minutes because of it, but still eat regardless xD).**

 **See you peoples in the next one thooo!**


	5. Secret Indulgences

**Hey guys^^**

 **I have taken a pretty long hiatus due to the holidays, as well as finals and a regent which JUST finished for me today. So no, I didn't completely ditch the story; all this crazy shit is gonna continue its little journey.**

 **Sit fucking tight, folks.**

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 **Secret Indulgences**

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Zamasu spent a full two weeks in her premises since he last met her friends. So far this marks near the end of the first month, which surprisingly, wasn't as bad as he thought it would be.

Irene allowed him time and solitude, which was something he was grateful for. It was balanced by the times where she'd try to talk to him, or anything involving interaction with her, and that alone would ruin every aspect of peace he would fortify while he was by himself. He found it easier to not pay attention to her talking in the phone over time; she even keeps going to that secret room that's forbidden to him, and right now he wasn't curious about her and whatever she does down there. It gave him time to look around, and he found himself outside most of the time. Sitting in her backyard and watching fireflies was calming, a heartsease that he so gravely needed everyday. Watching how the sky would change colors and how the stars would hide their faces as the sun peels upwards was what he looked forward to whenever he had the chance. Now here he was, Zamasu was never one to fall under temptation, he would never indulge in things because that is simply not what he grew up to be. Even in the long life span of a Kaioshin, he still remained true to not being indulgent and greedy, even if the opportunity is right in front of him.

Yes, right in front of him, in the form of a gold-outlined wrapped bar.

Zamasu looked down at the chocolate bar like he was playing an advanced game of chess. He knew he wasn't the type of person to plow into something thoughtlessly, he knew he always was polite when it came to taking something that isn't his. He looked to a spot above the chocolate bar, and there were three crumbled wrappers scattered on the kitchen table.

This was the third night in a row where he would spend the night eating one of her chocolate bars, and for some reason that number had been increasing ever since. The first night would be only one chocolate bar, and that would last him until the break of dawn. Then the next day came, and he ended up with two of them by his side while he sat on the backyard grass. And _now_ , he literally ate three within the last _two minutes_ , and here he was debating on whether or not he should just take this one, or leave it.

Well, technically there was a lot of bars, at least a dozen like… before, but now that number had more than halved in less than a week. So now there is five, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there are _no_ more bars. Zamasu's fingers crept towards the bar, and then he pulled back like he just touched a hot stove. Why is he acting so stupid now? Why is he being like this towards human, let's emphasize that, _human_ food; made by the same species who can't be trusted with the life they have been granted. Hell, they can't even trust _each other_ with their own lives, so how in the entire universe could he take delight in such a good treat from a horrible race like this? _There is nothing special about it anyway, it doesn't even taste that good, I shouldn't even be thinking about eating this right now_.

He literally thought that as he took another bite from the half-eatened bar that was in his green hands.

He kept the savory taste in his teeth long enough to sate his taste buds, but it wouldn't be enough for him to stop wholeheartedly, which would lead to him taking another bite, and repeating the process over and over again. If anything, he should be stopping right now so that it wouldn't completely finish-

Annnnd there sat an empty chocolate wrapper on his fingers. _Ugh…_ Things wouldn't have been that bad if he didn't hear the sound of footsteps making their way down the stairs.

 _Dammit._

Zamasu made put his best possible effort into grabbing the wrappers from the table without making too much noise, but also fast enough so that she wouldn't see them lying around her table. No, he wasn't doing this because he was afraid of her, because _hell no_ he wasn't, but rather because he felt like it was disgusting to even show that he enjoyed it. Irene was rubbing her eyes, her hair was put up into a large puff on top of her head. She walked into the kitchen sleepily, and stopped when she noticed a green God standing behind her countertop with the most inconspicuous facial expression he could muster.

She tilted her head, eyes still sleep-ridden. "...Zamasu?"

Straight faced, once again. "What?"

"What have you been doing?"

The way she said that hinted that she was getting somewhere, and Zamasu had to keep himself level for some stupid reason. "Haven't I told you that I don't need to sleep, woman?"

She smiled. "I'm pretty sure you don't need to eat late at night either."

Zamasu blinked, his eyes widened. "...What?"

She made this gesture, pointing around her lips and Zamasu reached up to a spot on his lips, pulling back and seeing a small stroke of chocolate on his finger. He blinked again, once, _twice_ , and then pursed his lips. Just how much was he actually enjoying that cursed bar of chocolate?

"Have you been eating my chocolate, Zamasu?"

He took tissue papers from a box on the table and wiped his lips clean of the chocolate, and then went to throw them out. He then turned to her, and answered her question with the most honest response anyone could be thinking of right now.

"What are _you_ doing up at this time?"

She tiredly squinted. "Don't answer my question with a question, Wasabi."

Oh, and she also adopted the nickname Wasabi and has been using it on him randomly, just to probably test his patience of course. _Of course_ … "It's more appropriate to answer. You're a human, humans need sleep."

"Aww, the Green Lantern is actually _caring_ now." He hated her so _damned much._ He was so steeped into thinking how much he hated her, that he didn't realize the slight gripe and slight pain in her voice as she said that, even if she was tired. "I just woke up because I couldn't kinda sleep. I am thirsty as hell too." She walked past him and went to get a cup of water, then stood right next to him as she sipped slowly. Zamasu's eye never twitched so much from something so little, and she started to chuckle. She was freaking chuckling at his glare, who does that?

Oh right. _Her._

"You look cute when you're mad, you know that?" Irene was smiling like an idiot again. "Your face and nose get all scrunched up and your eyes are all big and shit. Geez, just chill okay. I'm playing around."

Zamasu turned away and shook his head downwards. He walked away from his spot right next to her and made his way in the living room but not without noticing something a bit peculiar. Irene was standing no doubt, but she was also nearly _leaning forwards_ against the countertop. The cup that she was holding hid her facial expression, and it made Zamasu narrow his eyes. He would have dismissed it as her being tired, but her grip on the counter said otherwise. Now he was frowning; as far as he knew, humans as of now could stand upright for way more than a minute, what was making her do this?

Every bit of plain curiosity was on the verge of being voiced when she looked at him and he almost missed the downward curve of her lips, as well as her eyes showing strain. But then she smirked and started walking towards him. He didn't miss the way she slowly stood straight from leaning on the countertop.

"So this is what you do every night? You binge eat my food?" Her jokeful tone was nothing but light-hearted, but Zamasu didn't like her, so there was no such thing as that.

"Go back to sleep."

"You're not my dad."

"I am a Kaio. We created your species. So do as I say."

"Really?" She put her hands on her hips, and it was almost as if everything that he saw less than a minute ago never happened.

" _Yes_."

She stared at him for a long time, and he stared back at her to prove his point. Then she gave in and kissed her teeth. "Fine. I'ma sleep. Don't finish my chocolate, Lettuce."

Where do all these nicknames come from? "Why would I?"

She stopped dead in her tracks, turned on her heels and looked at him while walking all the way back into the kitchen and checked the trash bin. She then pointed, shocked, at all of the wrappers that Zamasu threw out. He just turned around and walked away.

"Well aight, Mr. God-and-almighty. I'ma go back to sleep." She walked right past him again and upstairs, and it Zamasu had to restrain himself from breaking all the bones in her body right then and there. When he was certain she was now in her room, he turned back to the trash bin.

The heck was that for? Why didn't he just _stop_ eating the stupid bars? Why did he continue to take more of it when he should have stopped? He sat down, pondering what in the red hell came over him in the past few days. You know what, let's just admit it; Zamasu liked chocolate. Really, _really_ liked it. And to be honest, there is nothing wrong with that. There _shouldn't_ be nothing wrong with that. So why is he feeling this uncommon feeling of disgust?

Well, because he hates humans. Pretty sure every answer to the way he acts is because he hates them.

And he hated humans to the point of where anything, any accomplishments, any revolutions, anything that humans made or coordinate was deemed undeserving or disgusting. That chocolate bar, _those_ chocolate bars, were made by the hands of filthy humans, the same ones who fight and make the entire beautiful globe of Desna look as dirty as them-

I think we get the point here. But to Zamasu, it's a pretty big point to make. Because that's all he knows about them, even though he would never word it that way.

What did Gowasu see in this woman? What did he see in this entire _trip_? It was a question that Zamasu had lingering every time he contemplates this year-long pause in his long life, you already know that's a lot of times. Why did Gowasu send him _here_ , to communicate with them, when Gowasu himself does nothing but observe them from afar. Did he think that Zamasu was… _inept_ at being his apprentice? So he puts him in the same place as the filthy species that he hates so much?

That thought alone made his blood boil. He clenched his hands, his eyes were hard and hot on the floor. He couldn't just _watch_ them from his own damned realm, he had to be inserted into their insignificant lives. Did Gowasu deem him that unfit? How could he-

 _Calm down_. His face felt hot. He closed his eyes. _Calm down, Zamasu. That is your teacher. He's doing this for the benefit of yo-_

And _how_ was he supposed to benefit from this? Irene is a horrible person, she doesn't know how to speak properly, she and her friends literally say things that don't make sense. He can't even understand most of what they say in the first place, how the hell is was he supposed to learn from them, if all they do is make references to candles and light and mispronounce the letter 'o' sometimes?

Well there is one thing he learned about humans; they're too carefree to be a surviving creation of the gods. There is literally nothing that one can do to stop him from ever thinking that way about them.

For now.

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A car pulls up right in front of Irene's house, it was entirely black and its rims were a clean steel hue. The door opens, and out comes a brown haired woman, her light complexion contrasted the color of the car. She was wearing a shirt and pants, Zamasu didn't know the type of shirt and pants she wore, that was all he could tell of it. He was standing right next to the window, making sure that he can see the woman, but also keeping himself outside of her view from the window. She didn't even looked towards the window away, she just continued walking towards the door, and Zamasu was hoping that she thought this was the wrong house just so that she could leave. That was wishful thinking at it's finest.

The second he heard the doorbell rang, his instant reaction was to pull back from the windows. He did that trademark 'fast-walk' to the stairs, and Irene was right there, blocking him from salvation.

"Nuh-uh, you stay _right_ there, mister!"

Was it her _job_ to annoy him? "I am not, and I repeat _not_ , going to be involved with you and your humans anymore."

She leaned forward while squinting her eyes. Zamasu hoped she would fall down the stairs instead. "How are you gonna learn anything if you don't wanna talk to other people, huh? Your teacher will be super upset at you." She sing-songed that last sentence and ran downstairs as she spoke. Zamasu didn't even have one foot on the stairs and she was already at the door, her hand was on the knob.

"DO NOT OPEN THAT DOOR-" He quickly turned around and ran upstairs, but unluckily for him (does luck even work for Gods anyway?), the wench opened the door while he was in mid-stride, in the middle of the stairway.

"BIIITCH I HAVEN'T SEEN YOU IN SO LON- is that James? Why is he dressed weirdly?"

Zamasu's head wasn't in view of the women, but from his waist and downwards were well in their line of vision.

"Rebecca, that's Zam-"

 _She's really doing this. She is really doing this to me. Why can't I just kill her? Would Gowasu be upset if I told him that she accidentally fell off of the roof of her house?_

"His name is Zamasu? That's the guy you were talking about before?" Rebecca was now in the house, she stepped to the side to wave at him. "Hi!"

 _Don't look back, don't look back, don't look back, just continue up the stairs…_

" _Turn around,_ Zamasu! Come on, can you at least be nice for once?"

As much as he wanted to just leave and not go back downstairs, he wasn't willing to give up his respectability just because of some low human woman. That's what he saw his actions to become; he wasn't going to be deemed anything other than diplomatic just because of them and how annoying they are. Does that make sense?

It does in Zamasu's head.

He turned around and looked at Rebecca, then he took a deep breath. " _Hello._ "

She gave him a raised eye, and turned to Irene. "Oh, he's probably really shy isn't he? I see. Anyways, I got something to tell you. Like, right now."

 _Where_ in his timber, in his face, in his entire body language, did he show he was shy? He may have to give a bit of leverage to Irene though, at least _she_ knew he was pissed from the get-go. But he still hated her more than everyone else he's met in the past three weeks. The women were now talking about things that he didn't care about, so he took that as his cue to go back upstairs and into his room.

He opened the door, stepped in and closed it softly, and almost instantly that same weird feeling started to puncture his stomach. It's that feeling that somehow made him stay outside of the house at night, instead of sitting in his room and watching the world through the window even though that was a much better view. Today he might as well ignore it and just sit here and think until Irene's friend is gone, he's been doing pretty well at ignoring things anyway.

Zamasu sat cross legged on his bed, he propped his elbow on his knee, resting his chin against his open palm. Was she always like this? How could someone act like this on a daily basis? How could someone _tolerate_ someone like this for any given amount of time? And why can't she watch her mouth every time she speaks? Is that really how her friends behave? It made him frown; how could they be friends? Don't they ever get annoyed of one another, because he sure as hell did. How do they find one another _tolerable_? It doesn't make sense at all, and Zamasu should have been there to actually invest in curing his curiosity, to actually watch and look at them instead of only hearing they're colloquialism and then basing all of them off of that. But he didn't want to, he thought he was right about humanity in the first place. A full year in this house would go nothing but bore and aggravate him at this point, unless if Irene planned on taking him somew-

Wait a minute, _why the hell_ would he want to travel around this planet? Well sure, it's beautiful, but Irene lived near the city, and anything without much natural to it doesn't look any near as amazing to Zamasu. But at the same time, he didn't fancy being in the same place, doing the same thing all the time. That's exactly what his life is like in his own realm.

His eyes twitched at the thought for two reasons; because it was true, and because he didn't really expect his train of thought to even cross that, and thinking about it made him scowl. He liked tea, but imagine having to serve your mentor tea repetitively, every single day, for _thousands of years_ ; you'd get bored of that, too.

It was something that lingered in his mind even before he came here, and every time he thought of it he would dismiss it immediately. And now looking around this bedroom that was both bigger and better looking than his own, he found himself dismissing a lot of things, especially if they made him feel some type of way. However, him ignoring his thoughts had never traced it's way back to his opinion on humanity.

He stood up and walked towards the window, gray eyes looking into the clear glass, and out to the world. One thing he could say is that almost every window he's looked through had an exceptional view of the outside. Even the backyard looked amazing at night. It was the perfect setting for reading a book, or watching the sun rise, or thinking about how much time you have left in a house with an annoying human until you leave. It's been three weeks, three weeks and three days since Gowasu dropped him off, and the only thing he learned was that he had more tolerance than he expected. How he hadn't snapped her neck yet was beyond his knowledge.

And speaking of _her_ , Zamasu was a bit confused at why she was walking the way she was, or why she would limp against the countertop, and why she was awake early in the morning. Sure, she was thirsty or something, but there was something else about her demeanor that told him otherwise. Maybe she was in pain.

 _Of course she was, smart one._

Humans and their easily tousled bodies, they are no match for the might of the gods. He could probably break all of her bones, if he wanted to, with one strike. If there is one thing you should know about Zamasu, it's that the man has a lot of self-control; he knows he can't hit her and wouldn't want to be castigated for it.

Unless if she puts her hands on him, then maybe he might do something little, like rip her arms off their joints.

He just realized that the grip he had on the fabric of his pants was super tightened, even thinking about her bothered him, obviously. He needed to think about good things like the weather. It was really, really nice outside earlier today, especially during the wee hours of the morning. The sun is out and bright, the sky is blue and clear, the breeze was so calming and peaceful… and then there was a knock on the door.

How long has he been sitting here? It literally felt like five minutes. He was certain that it was Irene at the door, and didn't feel like opening it just because of that.

Another knock sounded from the other side. "Zamasu. I know you in there, I have to talk to you."

He blinked twice. Her voice held a serious tone, well now he was slightly convinced that she didn't take everything as a joke. But when he opened the door, she was leaning forward again slightly, but he didn't notice that because all he saw was that smile on her face.

This is going to be bad.

"So… you know you've been spending too much time in my house right?"

 _Am I going to be able to leave? This soon?_ He would have perked up if she didn't continue her question the way that she did.

"Well, I thought it would be nice if you could out and about with me, you know, to actually see how big the world is."

Didn't he think of that _same exact_ situation earlier? With her dragging him to places? Why did synchronicity work the way he _didn't_ want it to? He breathed. "Have you forgotten that I have lived for thousands of years? I _know_ how big this planet is."

"Well, _sure_ , but have you been to Stonecold?"

He blinked. "To what?"

"It's an ice cream parlor." Irene briefed. Zamasu still had a confused look on his face. "You don't know what that is, don't you?"

Was it okay to say that he does know just for the sake of not having to go to wherever this 'Stonecold' place is?

"You don't know what it is, so I'm gonna take you there tomorrow."

"Wait!" Zamasu raised a finger and Irene raised her brow and his intonation. He didn't know why he raised his voice either. "What if I don't _want_ to go?"

Irene did that squinting thing where her nose also scrunches up in disbelief and confusion. "What kind of person doesn't like ice cream? You haven't even tried it, and knowing you, you'll end up liking it a lot."

He narrowed his eyes. "You don't know me."

"I know you well enough to know that you ate a few of my chocolate bars after being so bland about their taste in the middle of the night. So you'll definitely like ice cream." He made a face. "C'mon, Zee-Zee, stop being a party pooper."

"First of all, whatever the heck you just referred me as, don't _ever_ do it again. And second, I can easily go there by myself. I don't need you."

"Yeah, and I don't want to see a green man with a stank face on the cover of the newspapers for assaulting a clerk, okay." He hated how defiant she was. How could somebody be _this_ persistent? Does she not see how much he _hates_ her guts? You could practically feel it at this point.

"I'm not going-"

"Oh yes, you are going, and you're gonna like it, trust." She turned around without any room for him to object, and started towards her room. She turned around and looked at him when she got to and opened her door. "And my friends are also going too, so there is more company for all of us." And then the door was closed.

Has there ever been a moment when your eye twitched so hard that it actually slightly hurts? Zamasu's having that moment right now, and before he could throw anything at her door to somehow penetrate the wood and stab her straight in the jugular, he decided on the more healthier route; he turned around, and closed the door with a bit of force. Enough force to drop a canvas that was hanging on the wall outside in the hallway. He sat down on his bed and looked out the window, just to see the su-

And the moon is slowly making its way up the darkening sky. How long has he been sitting in here? That didn't matter because now he has the chance to go outside and calm his nerves down. Again.

As he made his way outside, his hand may have accidentally _slipped_ and landed on a chocolate bar. He didn't let go of it despite arguing in his head, because he wanted to irritate Irene. That is definitely the only reason he took it and spent his hours outside eating it.

Definitely.

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 **Now looks like Zamasu is gonna have to _actually_ speak to them, and this time he can't retreat anywhere. Well shit...**

 **I honestly have nothing else to put in this, other than I really hope you enjoyed this chapter! Feel free to review on this if you will :)**


	6. Newfound Discoveries

**HOLY SHIT I HATH RETURNED!**

 **This was by far the longest fucking hiatus I've ever taken from something (technically this is my first, tf am I talking about) But I am giving y'all a LONG ASS CHAPTER; this right here was more than thirteen pages in Docs (I stopped counting after that lol)**

 **It took a month and some for me to update one whole fucking chapter, Jeebus…**

 **I will be on my grind. Junior year is a conglomerate of papers and endless amounts of tea. That note placed earlier will be deleted shortly after the upload of this chapter, so to all y'all in the future that see this and have no idea what note I am talking about;** _ **don't worry about it :3.**_

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 **Newfound Discoveries**

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The first thing she heard was the sound of her phone vibrating, making her heavy eyes slowly open and a tiny groan escape from her mouth. Irene pulled her face from her pillow, and pushed herself up from her bed since she was sleeping on her stomach. She was actually surprised that she was able to get some sleep last night, in fact, right now she wasn't even feeling anything. It's almost as if they were all gon-

Irene bent over in her sitting position and pulled her knees under her chest after feeling a cramp erupt in her groin. _As if I woulda thought._

Yup, she was on her menstrual cycle. And usually, Irene barely ever felt pain at all, mainly because she moved a lot and at all times, and lately she hasn't been doing that. Yesterday it felt like her uterus was getting dropkicked by an iron boot with lego pieces on the bottom, and now it the pain is a bit less but it's nowhere near where she'd like it to be. Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed and standing up, she looked at her digital clock: 11:45 A.M. When did she fall asleep yesterday? Everything after 12 midnight was her curling up and cramping and regretting not buying some ice cream and bananas the week before. Geez, can she even get a break?

Actually, nope she can't. She wanted to take a _certain someone_ along with her friends to Stonecold today, and Irene was certain that he was going to put up a fight with her over it. Zamasu always did whenever she breathed in his direction, and she always was able to put up with it. Technically, it's something that she's come to understand in a very short amount of time with the help of his mentor; had he not tell her how shitty and grumpy he was, she might've started boxing on him a couple of weeks earlier.

Already, she had finished brushing her teeth and is now undoing the band around her curly hair. Instantly, she gritted her teeth when she realized the band wouldn't completely come off her head and was stuck in the tangles of her kinky curls, the problem with natural hair, _Oh for fucks sake_. It didn't take long to get it out of her head. She changed into a pair of sweatpants and a large T-shirt that actually belonged to Adrian, he completely forgot about it when he slept over, and walked down the stairs with no pain whatsoever. She was about to turn to the kitchen and she noticed Zamasu walk back into the kitchen from outside. He looked at her, and was about to turn around and go back outside.

"Zama-" _Ooooh_ nope, that was her cramps again. Just when she was about to speak, and her uterus had to metaphorically implode in on itself. He looked back at her again.

"So is it that you can't speak now?"

"Umm, if you haven't noticed, I'm kind of in a bit of pain, okay." She raised her arm in a matter-of-fact gesture, and Zamasu did his trademark stank face but it was kind of watered down. Maybe because she didn't annoy him as much with what she just said, _surprisingly_.

Zamasu stepped forward to her and closed the door, then he turned to the kitchen countertop. He actually knew that she was in pain since yesterday, and maybe even before that, but he never really questioned it because it would almost looked like she was trying to hide it, and also because he hated her. That will always be a valid reason for why he acts like this towards her, no question. Irene went to the fridge, passing right by Zamasu and her hair touched his chin. Instantly, he had the thought of wanting to twist her disrespectful neck.

She fished out a yellow box that Zamasu didn't know about, what he read off it if she didn't move so much was the word 'Waff', and it made him raise his eyebrow as to why there would be something called a 'waff' in a fridge? She placed the box down on the countertop, he finally got to read the entire word and he was still confused.

"You look confused."

 _You didn't need to voice it aloud, vermin._ "What is that?" He pointed.

"Oh, these are Waffles. It says it right here you know." _I will tear off your limbs and throw it to swarming hungry, angry vultures in the sky._ She didn't look at his face, but continued. "Ya put some butter and sprinkle some cinnamon on these babies, and then put 'em in the waffle toaster over there, and after they're done, you can eat it with syrup." She pulled three of them out, Zamasu took note of the grid-like structure of the waffles. Placing them on a plate, she then took out the butter and then a small glass container with brown stuff in it which he assumed was the cinnamon, and then she looked at him. "Do you want some?"

He looked at the circle-grids on the plate, then back at her, and she did this pouty-face that had he not instill in his mind that he hated her so much, he would've thought she looked cute. "It wouldn't hurt to try one, Zamasu."

It really wouldn't, the rational and calm part of his mind told him, it really wouldn't hurt to try it especially if he was put here to learn about this species. Besides, it's food; why would he ever turn down food? The thought of that took him back to his life in the Kaio realm and how bland the food there was. _Perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to try this out for once… for once._

He sighed a long sigh. "Fine then. I'll have one."

Irene raised her brows; she thought this was him beginning to turn a new leaf. However, the glare on his face said otherwise. She just smiled and went on to her waffles doing the whole usual routine, just putting the butter and then the cinnamon and finally placing it into it's toaster. She looked at him with her brows raised and noticed him staring at the waffle as it was being made, as if she was gonna sprinkle anthrax on it or something.

"Hey." She caught his attention, he snapped back to her and gave her a look. Again. "I'm not poisoning your food okay. I'm pretty sure you're not allergic to cinnamon, right?"

Is this woman stupid? "I am a Kaioshin. _We_ created your species, so I am immune to all of your spices and… illnesses." He didn't expect Irene's eyes to widen, or her to look down at her stomach and back to him.

She got slightly defensive. "I'm not sick, Zamasu. I'm just on my period, that's not an illness, fam."

He completely forgot, or rather didn't think, of her earlier behavior yesterday; how she would lean in on the table at night and strain her face. He wasn't even talking about her, but the human assumed so, which technically he _did_ think she was sick at first. Now Zamasu was very knowledgeable in the things humans did or whatever happens to them, he had watched them for thousands of years, so he knew what a menstrual cycle was and what it did to most women in the process. So it does make sense as to why Irene was like that before, and that was actually one of his first guesses.

"I figured." Would it be mean to prepare for more annoyance simply because she was on her menstrual cycle? He's seen how cramps can irritate a human female over the course of a week. "I wasn't talking about you. I was generally speaking about human illnesses as a whole; I am immune to them."

"Lucky." Irene squinted at him with a smile on her face. "I guess green people do have it easy."

His eye twitched. "I am a Kaioshin."

"I know, I know, but I'm right with you being green right?"

This conversation could have been better. He didn't say anything because even though he didn't like the way she referred to him, he couldn't say she was wrong. So he just decided to make some tea, which he found on a cabinet during one of his I-will-not-eat-any-chocolates-at-all nights. Instead of a tea bag, it was actually a glass jar about half the size of his hand filled with green tea herbs. This is the only thing he could confidently make here on Desna. He took the kettle from the stove and went to the sink to pour water in it, and returned it back to its original place. He looked down at the dials of the stove, and then at it's smooth surface; it had four dull rings spaced evenly and was a complete sleek black. He had no idea on how to work this thing.

"I got it." Irene came over, turned the dial clockwise until it was facing the right, and then back up a little bit more again. He noticed the ring underneath the kettle was starting to light up. What a weird-looking stove. She turned to him, her kinky hair whipping around as she placed her hand on her hips. "You're welcome."

He just grimaced. " _Thank you._ "

"And by the way, can you make some for me?" She smiled like a child would if they asked their parent for a new toy. Zamasu narrowed his eyes, but took it into consideration, since she was making his waffles, it would be fair to make her some tea wouldn't it? He had to be at least a bit more diplomatic, even though he hated her guts- how many times should this even be said? He just grunted a 'yes', which Irene took with consideration.

And speaking of consideration, she done considered sitting down and just waiting for the waffles to finish because her uterus was doing sideways somersaults. That probably didn't even make sense. She did a tiny stretch sitting down, all the while running her palms through her hair as if she was going to tie it back. _Like hell, I could tie this giant mane back with the way it is. Ughhhh._ Natural hair is a pain in the ass, but she couldn't not love her hair.

She noticed Zamasu's head turn to her kitchen door, eyes wandering around its clean glass frame, and he turned around. She took this moment to question why the blue turtle shell heck he was still in his Power Ranger outfit, when it was at least 92 degrees outside. Does he ever swea- do gods even get hot? Maybe he doesn't feel hot in that, and even though Irene's house is well-conditioned and comfortable, it's nowhere near a 'sweater season' condition. She took another moment to look at his grey eyes, and how he was now looking down at an empty teacup, drumming his fingers pensively against the ceramic surface.

For some reason, she knew he wasn't much a shitty person even though he does act like one. If it were some other dude, she probably would have rolled him off and gave him an earnest and very polite middle finger, but she couldn't do that to Zamasu. He reminded her of a stubborn child, like one that's whining about going to preschool. Not saying that he is whiny, but he's stubborn, and he scowls a lot. She finds it cute; he simply just doesn't know. That's why she couldn't get really mad at him, even though she probably _should_ , but it would be kind of tasteless if she just stayed mad at him because he hated her species; what was he gonna learn from that? She'll just let him come to understand her kind from being around them, and she somehow knew that he would quit being a cactus and actually accept things, because he did have a problem with acceptance.

"Why are you staring at me?"

Irene blinked twice. Zamasu looked at her, as though he knew she was semi-psychoanalyzing him, and she just smirked. Matter of fact, she raised a statement that she completely forgot to make. "Please do not wear that when we have to go out later."

That didn't answer his question, Zamasu still looked down at his outfit and back at her. "What's wrong with it?"

She stood up and got the waffles from the toaster. Two on one plate for her, and one on the other for Zamasu. Irene made a quick mental note, and went to the fridge to get two more waffles, and proceeded to place them in the toaster, this time allowing it to cook for a bit longer. She turned to him. "Look at how I'm dressed. Humans don't dress like that, you're gonna stick out like a sore thumb."

"I'm not _human_ , you cretin."

"I _know_ that." She disregarded the malice in his voice when she said 'human'. "But don't you think it would be nice to dress a little more… comfortably, and less out-of-place. I don't think you'd want a bunch of us humans to stare at you."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. Maybe his clothing was a bit eccentric, but he raised another point. "You don't think that they do that even if I was dressed the same as your kind?" And with that he pointed to his face. Irene stuck out her bottom lip, as if pensive on his looks.

Okay, he may be akin to an angry cabbage. "I mean sure, you're green and all, but your clothing would stand out more. And then people will think you're an alien." she proceeded to place both plates on the table, and Zamasu stood up to fix up their tea. He came back and place it down on her side and walked back to his chair, a well-developed habit of his when he served Gowasu's tea. Irene on the other hand had honey, it was organic, in a small glass pitcher. She glazed his waffle with the syrup, all slow and elegant as if this was an IHop commercial, and did the same for her waffles. She sat down and topped hers off with a cherry. "I have stuff you could wear, I think it would fit you pretty well-"

"Umm, _no_." Zamasu looked at her with so much objection, that it almost looked sassy. "I don't want to wear your human clothing. I don't know what you've done with it."

"Boy, what would I do with clothes that would make you so uptight?" She raised her brow and her palm outstretched. "I mean, the least I could give you is a white T-shirt. I think you can still wear your pants…" her voice trailed off as she looked down at his face, and then she made a face. "And definitely not those giant boots."

Here is a human woman giving him makeshift fashion advice. Zamasu did the best straight face he could muster, he didn't even touch his waffle yet. He did consider what she said, mostly because the thought of such a judgemental species staring at him, and him not being able to plow their skulls in, would piss him off greatly.

He accepted her advice with a giant grain of salt. " _Fine_." He looked down at his waffle, it had a cinnamon whiff to it, and it smelled amazing. But because Zamasu was sitting across from an annoying human woman, let's just say it smelled _decent_.

Let's just _say_ that.

He looked at the fork and knife, obviously he was supposed to cut it and eat pieces of it. So he did just that; he cuts a small piece from the waffle, watching as the syrup on its edge would drip back down delectably onto the waffle and the plate. The end of the fork made its way to his mouth, and he bit down on the waffl-

 _By Kami…_

 _What is this magic?_ How the heck does Desna food taste so good? And why hasn't he read a book on Desna's food yet? He might have to search for that one, definitely-

"Holy shit, what'd you do to this tea? It tastes amazing, god damn." Irene took another joyous sip from her cup again and again, and Zamasu raised an unsurprised brow. "It's not as sweet as I'd make it, but it still tastes great."

Here's the thing about Zamasu; he's made tea for so long that it starts to resonate according to how he feels. If he's upset or angry, the tea would taste 'hollow', as Gowasu put it, and if he is in a good mood, the tea would be sweet, perfect and something to savour. If he's ambitious, or in rare cases greedy, his tea would be too sweet, and if he was feeling bored and drained, the tea would be void of sweetness. A lot really goes through him as he's preparing tea, and in conjunction these feelings end up manifesting in his tea. It took Gowasu many years to really understand how his apprentice would feel day to day, and Zamasu got the gist of that just from serving him tea. However, Gowasu wasn't here, instead Irene is sitting across from him sipping his tea like it was water from Kami's personal springs.

"I just made it." He shrugged, obviously trying not to show how much he relatively, and by relatively meaning _really_ enjoy the taste of waffles.

"Well you got some skills or something, I might just ask you to make me some everyday." She laughed, and Zamasu just went back to eating his waffle for an unspoken reason. "Or just teach me how you do this shit, I'd really benefit from a mean cup of tea-umm, dude?"

For some reason, for an obvious reason, Zamasu had a mouth full of waffle pieces with one little piece still on the fork that was moving towards his mouth. He looked at her with, eyes a bit wider than usual, and then he actually tried to scowl with his mouth full. Irene busted out laughing. "Bruh, calm down. I have more cooking if you want them too." Low-key, she knew he would want to eat more than one due to his last affairs with her chocolate bars. However, she didn't think he'd damn near scarf down that whole waffle in like ten seconds.

He didn't even speak, he just looked down at his now empty plate, and then back at the weird lit-up toaster. Irene sighed and was about to get up, when she had the urge to sneeze. Right after she did, she made a face of pure uncomfort. Imagine sitting down and then having to sneeze and feeling as though your lower body turned into Niagara Falls.

That is by far the worst analogy ever made about periods.

Zamasu raised a brow and all she said was "Cramps, bro." She stood up this time, and took his plate, starting to put the two other now finished and freshly steaming waffles out of the toaster.

"What are you doing?"

She turned to him. "You damn near swallowed the whole plate, I'm just getting you more."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "I am not hungry anymo-"

"Right, right, o-kay, here you go." She placed the plate in front of him, now the waffles were melting the butter on top of it along with the dripping syrup, and Zamasu unintentionally swallowed. "Go ahead and eat, Wasabi."

It's like every time something remotely good is in his presence, she derails it by speaking and breathing and existing. "Shut your mouth."

She shrugged and smiled. How has he not punched her face inwards already? He took a bite, and savored the taste like he did with his first. He didn't want to be greedy with his chewing, so he took his time to enjoy the first piece and with every single second that passed, the taste got even better. He swallowed, and went for another, and another, and another. And then Irene started laughing.

"Dude, you should have seen the look on your face. You look like you were eating something out of God's personal kitchen."

He instantly denied it. "No I wasn't."

"Yes you were."

"No I wasn't."

"Yes, you _were_."

"No."  
"Yes."

" _No._ "

" _Yeeesss-_ "

Luckily, Irene's phone started to ring and she kind of jumped, because she didn't think her phone was downstairs. So she went to check the Caller ID, and looked at Zamasu. "Fine then, maybe you weren't. I gotta take this call so keep enjoying yourself." With that she took her phone and answered it while skipping towards the stairs.

Zamasu took his sweet time to finish eating the waffles and he glanced at the clock; 12:39 PM. He made this really inaudible but irritated groan, because it was already becoming the afternoon and that means that there is less time for him to do what he wanted, and Irene might have to drag him out of her house for this 'Stonecold' place. He didn't even know when they were going to leave, and he was tied on wanting to know and not minding it. Hopefully, time would be lenient enough to _take it's time_ for today, and once again that made no sense. After he finishes this delectable-

 _Decent._

Decent… Waffle, Zamasu will look into a few books in order to pass the hopefully-slowed-down-for-his-sake time.

V **¨·..·¨** V **¨·..·¨** V **¨·..·¨** V **¨·..·¨** V **¨·..·¨** V **¨·..·¨** V

You'd think that sitting down and reading one book would take someone with the reading level of an overly excelled bachelor would take at least a few hours right? You would expect that the time between 12 and 5 PM were exactly _five full hours_ apart, right? You'd think a godly apprentice wouldn't be confused when a certain human woman told him it was time to get ready at _5:30PM_ , almost five hours after he had finished eating, _right_?

Well, apparently not.

Zamasu blinked when he heard her backyard door slide open along with the sound of her voice, and the words 'out' and 'ready' were the first words his mind registered by default. He literally did this where he scrunched up his brows and looked down at his _half finished_ book, and then returned his gaze back to her.

"...What time is it?"

Irene propped her fist on her hip while leaning against the door. "Bruh, it's 5:30 right now. We gots to _goooo_."

Zamasu sighed. And then groaned. "Fine, but do _not_ force me to talk to any of your idiot friends. I don't like any of them, at _all_."

He says that now, but that sentiment would be wiped out by something else in a few months.

"How are you gonna learn anything if you don't want to be apart of anything?" Irene was standing behind him now and she had the nerve to tap his shoulder and tell him to get ready again.

"Touch me one more time and I will end you." He whipped around with a green finger up, gray eyes narrowed dangerously. She just sighed.

"Come onnnn, we are going to be late, you idiot! I have your clothes chilling in your room right now, so go." She then turned around and went on her way to prepare herself, and Zamasu got up slowly and made his way to his temporary room.

"...Are you kidding me?" Even though he knew he was supposed to change his attire due to 'looking weird', he didn't think he'd wear something so… casual? He never wore something so informal before. What laid in front of him was a white V-neck shirt, along with a pair of black joggers that had a wide white strip at each side, along with a pair of black, red, and mostly white sneakers. He slowly picked up and felt at the clothing before putting them on. He felt so weird, the stuff he was wearing was so informal, yet comfortable at the same time. It was a new thing for him especially, since his uniform is the only article of clothing he's ever wore. He moved around in it, walked all throughout his room, sat on his bed, did a roundhouse kick, just random stuff to see how fit it was on him. Apparently, it fit very well for his 5'11 frame.

Now it was on to his sneakers. Mind you, he has no idea what these articles of clothing were called specifically, this is the author speaking on behalf of this. He stared at the designs; they were like haphazard placed triangles all around the sides, them being black and red. The rest of the sneakers were a clean white color, with the exception of black and white laces. He slipped them on, and yes even though he's never seen sneakers he's had boots, he knows how to put on clothes, okay. Almost instantly, his white eyebrows raised at the soft-firm feel of its insides around his feet. Everything about this outfit was so informal and casual, it was _super_ alien to him.

He walked downstairs, looking down at his shoes as he did so. When he reached the floor of the living room, he planted his feet on the ground, making a sound of actual approval of his attire.

And then he heard a voice.

"See, I _told_ you you'd like this getup. Now you don't look as nerdy."

It's like a constant cycle of him being remotely okay with something, and then Irene somehow popping up from wherever and ruining it completely for him.

"It's _decent._ " _Comfortable,_ but he'll say decent because he won't truly admit how nice it feels to not wear a uniform all the time. Well he would, but not to _her_. "Are we going to leave? I just want to get this over with."

She made a face at his complaint-ridden voice while grabbing her keys off the countertop. "Trust me, you're definitely not gonna _want_ to get this over with."

 _Oh yes, I would-_ "Why are you looking at me like that?"

Irene was now opening the door. "I didn't think that you'd have a build underneath that Power Ranger suit."

Zamasu looked down, blinked, and back up at her, and frowned. "What are you talking about?"

She looked exasperated, _the nerve of this woman_. "I'm just saying you got a nice body." Her translation made more sense than having to refer to him like one would a piece of machinery, but maybe it's the way she talks.

 _Well, her way of talking is stupid._

He stepped outside her door, instantly greeted by the pleasant breeze of the evening. Since it was in the summer, having breeze like this is a blessing. But what would be even more of a blessing than anything? Getting to sit outside in weather like this and reading a book to pass time, and to be one with this beautiful planet.

Zamasu realized that he had been standing right in front of her marveling at the feeling of the weather while Irene was already in the car giving him this impatient 'What the heck are you doing' look, and suddenly the breeze didn't feel so nice anymore.

He shot her a look back, and walked to her car. The seat right next to her was empty so obviously he would sit there- _actually_ it would be much nicer to sit in the back wouldn't it? So that way she wouldn't be that efficient in bothering him, and it would help restrain him from pulling her guts out. So he sat in the back, and almost instantly Irene looked confused.

"But why the back tho'?"

Zamasu crossed his arms. "Because I want to."

She started to laugh, and Zamasu wanted to crush her lips with his fists. Irene's brown eyes looked over at him and his demeanor; he had his arms crossed, and he was doing that pouting thing again. He was also in perfect posture too, so he looked like a child who didn't get his favorite candy at the grocery store. "You're cute when you're mad."

His eye twitched. "Just start your whatever this is and drive off I don't want to hear your voice."

"... It's called a car…"

" _Whatever_." That was sort of unlike him, and it reminded him of how he used to be when he was younger. Well technically he's still _young_ but, when he was _younger_ , he had a habit of dismissing things and acting a little-

"So much sass, Wasabi. Chill it." She started her car and accelerated, turning around just in time to not catch Zamasu making a choking gesture near her right ear.

The first two minutes of the ride was relatively quiet, and Zamasu was leaning against the window, eyes wandering around as the car passed her street. Irene lived in a relatively suburban area, the houses were not close together, but they were not too far apart. There was a nice comfortable between each house, and these houses each were as big as hers. Now that he thought about it, he didn't actually think much of how big her house was; she had around five or six bedrooms, including his and excluding hers, a spacey hallway that wasn't too big, a large kitchen with a countertop table and a door across from her even larger living room. Two shelves that mostly held books were placed on the sides of her wall-mounted TV. There was another wide but short corridor that led to a big mahogany-themed dining room. He never been in any of her bathrooms before, but he had taken a glance upon it at one point. She actually had two bathrooms that he knew of, the first one that was upstairs was tiled, and had various shades of brown and white accents on her walls. If one were standing across from the door, they would see the large bathtub primarily composed of marble, and a mat right in front of it.

Surprising as it is, her house looked very… modest. There was nothing too flashy nor anything screaming that one was rich. It wasn't minimalist, the amount of paintings and drawing that hung on her wall showed that for sure, but the house had a quiet vibe about it, and that was something pleasant. He did look over her bookshelf, and saw a couple books that were related to Feng Shui. When he found that out, he was really surprised that she somehow knew something about this. He will never, ever say it to her face, but it _did_ indeed impress him. Gowasu happened to be a master at this art, and it's something that Zamasu has been very good at picking out aspects of Feng Shui in houses.

 _No wonder why Gowasu chose this woman. He probably just liked the way her house looked._ The thought amused him, but that still doesn't change her disgusting personality. If he took the time to really appreciate the look of the house, he felt that her face would pop out of nowhere and make another analogy of food out of him again. That almost _always_ happens, for the past three -and then some- weeks now.

His thoughts went to the secret room of hers. The front of Irene's house had stairs that led you up to her door. There was a top floor above where the rooms were, and that could probably - _definitely_ \- be the secret room. There were blue curtains covering all throughout the windowed floor, so he could not see what was in there. And there was no piquing curiosity that he had, because she'd be in there for long periods of time and he would be somewhere else trying not to acknowledge her existence. She would always come out of there and go directly up to shower and he would never catch how she looked whenever she exited the floor.

There is a lot of things that he doesn't know about her, but at the moment he doesn't want to know anything about her because she's not diplomatic. That'll change; he wouldn't know it, but that will change.

Zamasu was slowly pulled from his thought when he heard a thumping rhythmic noise, a drum, along with other instruments mixed in with it. At first he frowned, and then found himself slightly nodding to the beat. He didn't know what it was, but it definitely wasn't something made purely by hand-played instruments, it was… weirdly catchy, though.

"Ooooooooo, I didn't think you'd like EDM."

His automatic response was "I don't like it."

And he could _feel_ her sneer. "Are you sure about that?"

"Yes." Now he can't enjoy the music because if he does, then he'll be lying about what he said, even though he is already, but Irene doesn't need to know that.

"Well, fine. It was made by Adri and Jay, those two come correct _all_ the time."

What kind of English is she speaking? "Who are those people?" They sounded sort of familiar, wait-

"My friends. You met them the other week. How do you already forget this?"

"I didn't meet them. You gave me their names and you all started speaking randomly." They did, and it really irked him, because that shows that they somehow knew about him _prior_ to actually seeing the dude, which explains why they weren't bowing on the spot. Not that it's something that'd he really expect, but… this guy is thousands of years old, he shouldn't be treated like a _less than_.

"Okay, but now you'll be able to talk to us, and that's _if you don't walk away_." They were at a stop sign, and Irene took this time to look back at him. "I suggest you don't because you might get lost and I don't want that to happen."

Zamasu blinked like four times and gave her the straightest face a green man could muster. "I'm not a child, woman."

"My name is Irene, and I know you're not a child. You just never… been here." It was her cue to drive again, she was now facing the road. The kinky strands of her bunned hair would bounce while she drove. Zamasu paid little attention to this.

"Fine. As long as you all don't do what you did last time."

Now Irene made this head gesture that allowed those curly strand to fall to the side. "Bro, we are friends, what do you expect? You think we're gonna have a rigid conversation? It's not a business meeting, Zamasu. And also, you wouldn't even engage with us, at least try to do that too, we are already comfortable with you."

It would be sad to say that Zamasu knew nothing of random, out-of-nowhere conversations that have no direction whatsoever because he had no such kind of relationships with anyone throughout his life, but he's not human. He's a god apprentice who lived since human civilization began, so as such a high-regard and busy being, he shouldn't even be concerning himself with any of that. So it shouldn't bother him.

It _shouldn't_. But that pit in his stomach says otherwise and he refuses to acknowledge it.

"I can't tell if you're zoning out or if you're silently agreeing with me."

Green eyes looked at the back of the light brown woman's head. "I will play by your little rules, then. I don't see the point in going anywhere at this point."

"We are getting food."

A little part of him lit up knowing that already, but on the outside it was just his eyebrow shrugging nonchalantly. "And?"

"You get to _eaaaaaat_ it."

"You're trying to entice me with food?"

"Not really, I already know you're gonna like ice cream."

"How?" Raised brow.

"Remember those chocolates that you didn't like?"

"Shut your mouth." The smartest thing that he could have done was evade her sentence by saying 'What chocolates?', but he was caught red-handed, in the act of _hating_ chocolate bars, so he instantly felt the need to make her shut up.

"Nooooo." She sing-songed and did a little dance while sitting. How long was this ride? He's pretty sure a good twelve minutes have passed since they left the house. He was already getting impatient.

And that is very antithetical because Zamasu is a _very_ _patient_ person. No, seriously.

The car stopped in a parking lot with a lot of other cars, Zamasu looked around noticing no sign of a building near him. Instantly, he got defensive. "What are you doing?"

"We in a parking lot, silly. We gotta walk a little to the place. It's right over there." She literally pointed to a spot behind him, which was the side of the building. Zamasu felt kind of stupid, but brushed it off when they walked to the front and Irene slapped her palm on her face. He looked at her, and then at what she looked at before she did that.

The place was called 'Cold Stone', and Irene was saying it wrong since yesterday. "Idiot."

"But I know what parking lots are though."

He narrowed his eyes at her. "Shut up."

There were people walking all throughout the street and he assumed this wasn't a heavily populated vicinity, once again a good thing for him. One thing he did notice was how some people would stop and look at him _and_ her, mostly Irene. Now that right there is a positive on this part, but he was relatively confused as to why they were regarding her that way.

One of the woman that were looking at her came up to her with a large smile on her face. "Irene Lysette?"

Irene turned to face the woman. "Yup, that's me."

Almost instantly, the woman started praising her. "I really, really, _really_ love all of your works, you are one of my favorite artists and also my daughter's favorite. She has almost all your works in _Oak_ and _Fringe_ , you're a giant inspiration of hers."

"Oh my gosh, really?" Irene's brown eyes widened, she smiled so warmly that Zamasu knew and felt the sincerity. "Hopefully one day I'll run into her. I've been out a lot, she probably might even catch a glimpse of me, I bet." It was… something to see someone praised so highly, and then having the said person be completely comfortable with you enough to speak so casually. It was almost endearing.

The woman was now more calm and less overexcited. Now she was just comfortable. "Ohh, she won't be around because she's in university right now. But dear, thank you so much. I really can't express so much because I have a shift to work right now, but I saw you and just have to say thank you very much. God bless you!" They gave each other a hug, and the woman went on her way after Irene's 'Bye, it was nice to meet ya!'. Zamasu followed the woman's trail with her eyes for half a second, and then down at the floor in thought, and then Irene tapped his shoulder.

"My dude, let's goooooooo. They're waiting for us in there." Matter of fact, now she was tugging on his shirt sleeve gently. Zamasu gave her this look, and then sighed and followed her in.

Almost immediately, they both were met with multiple voices saying a mix of 'Ayyyy', 'Yoooo', and 'Bruuuh'. Zamasu stopped and blinked while Irene returned their welcoming chants or something. Adrian and Jay got up and both tag-team hugged her. _They act like they haven't seen each other in years_.

"Irene, I swear don't ever text me while I'm friggin sleeping I lit- _Woahhhh, hold on…_ " Jay's gazed went straight to Zamasu's outfit, Zamasu even technically forgot that he wasn't wearing his uniform. "My dude got some fresh ass getup today, _damn son_. I like that." Jay went over to him and raised his hand like one would do for a dap, but Zamasu didn't know what that was; all he saw was Jay raising his hand in an angle, so he just kind of… raised his hand to give him a five, and Jay chuckled. "How are ya, tho'?"

"I'm fine." And then Adrian had a positive inquisitive response to his look.

"Bruh, are those my clothes?"

Zamasu frowned. "Wait, _what_?" he instantly looked to Irene, who was innocent in all of this. "This is his?"

Adrian looked at her. "Really, 'Rene?"

She had her fingernail on her lower lip, and she had these doe eyes. "I dunno what y'all are talking 'bout."

"You know exactly what we're talking about." Adrian leaned forward and narrowed his eyes, and then looked at Zamasu. "...Alright, I'm not even gonna lie, you do look good in my stuff. I didn't think we were the same height."

Zamasu now noticed the stature of the man before him; Adrian was _exactly_ his height, he had a lean build like Zamasu did, but he was wearing a black bomber jacket with a grey sweater and black zipper pants.

"You rocked that shit better than he did." Jay chimed in to Zamasu, leaning right next to Adrian just to annoy him, and then nearly skipping to sit back down in his seat.

"Boi shut up, we _both_ rock my shit." Adrian stood right next to him and crossed his arms, and Zamasu chuckled softly. Zamasu got the feeling that this Adrian was a level person, surprisingly a more calm version of Irene. He almost would have assumed the two to be siblings but he knew they weren't. The guy had, like Irene, a comfortable air of confidence around him, a very likeable trait of a person. "I spent a good hundred on these joggers alone."

Jay turned in his seat. "Bruh, that's like the most expensive part of your wardrobe right there." Irene snorted; if anyone knew how _'budgety'_ Adrian was to clothes, it was Jay, and Jay knew that because he was the same exact way. It wasn't that the men were penny pinchers, but it was because they both knew how to style without having to spend so much.

"We all gotta sit down. Zamasu, come and sit next to me." Irene motioned for him to take the seat to her right; the place had tables that were able to fit six people. When they both reached the table -it wasn't that long of a walk- Irene sat and patted the seat down from him. His eyebrows shrugged; he'll go along with it, for the sake of his temperance. There was a red purse on the table, and then from another corridor came a very familiar looking woman.

"Irene! You're just gonna sit there and look at my purse?"

"Are you deadass right now…" she got up and did a half jog to her best friend and gave her a giant hug. Zamasu still didn't understand why they rejoiced like they've aged in time with wine, well he _did_ , but it wasn't that long of a break.

"Bruh you really think she's gonna full on 'iSpy' just to see you?" Adrian leaned forward and looked at Rebecca because Jay was right next to him blocking his view. His playful tone was registered by the woman and she laughed.

"Shut up, Drizzle."

Jay instantly turned around, and both mean had the same exact straight face adorned. "Okay, we are not gonna talk about that." Zamasu assumed this was an inside joke.

Irene and Rebecca took their seats respectively; Irene sat to Zamasu's left, Adrian was across from him to his right, Jay right in front of him, and Rebecca was to his front left. He took the time to look at each and every person facing him right now.

Adrian was of mixed race, like Irene. He had long curly hair that went down to his mid-back, it was pulled back into a ponytail. Of the three in front of him, Zamasu already knew he was going to be easier to communicate with, if he ever had to.

Jay was an Asian man the same age as his sidekick, Adrian. His hair was actually really long, it was straight and went down below the table. It wasn't in a ponytail, rather kept free and it's slightly wavy texture gave off the impression of casual. He sounded like someone who probably never touched a uniform in their life ,or wouldn't _want_ to at all, and his way of speaking was akin to Irene's, except more brash than annoying.

Rebecca was a white woman, one who Irene knew for the longest, apparently. She was very casual and cool around her friends, but he knew this woman had a job or occupation that required diplomacy just from the way her posture was so poised. She didn't speak in that weird way that the others did as much, in fact it even looked like she and Jay were complete opposites, and they were sitting next to each other.

"What are you guys gonna order?" Jay was now looking at the menu, his white sweater had sleeves that went up to his knuckles making him look much younger than he really was. The menu itself wasn't actually on laminated paper, but rather on a small computer-like device. "I'm probably gonna get like that one cookie dough cake, and some French vanilla ice cream and- _ooooh_ maybe I might get frozen yogurt and-"

"Jay, you finna eat the whole store?" Irene laughed, and Adrian snorted. Rebecca looked down at her lap with soft chuckles coming from her mouth.

"You _don't understand_ , I am hungry as hell right now. Me and Adrian haven't had something to eat since this morning."

Adrian made a gesture. "And by this morning, he means at around 2PM."

Irene frowned. "That was three hours ago."

Jay did this mock-pout and placed the menu on the table's surface. "You know me _well enough_ I get hungry five minutes _after_ dinner, okay."

"I agree." Adrian shrugged. "Not only that, but the whole car ride here was crazy as hell. First of all,we went somewhere to buy some shit, and then took the wrong exit lane because _this one_ thought it was a shortcut."

Jay whipped his head and gave Adrian a look, and then playfully punched his arm. "It was, if we took the 5 off of the highway, we would have got here later, you dumbass."

"But you had to circle around several avenues to get to the _same exact path that it would have been if it were off exit 5_."

"Okay listen, the good thing is, we are all here. All six of us." Rebecca raised her arms in regards. "So you two can go argue like a married couple later, let's just order our ice cream and enjoy ourselves."

Jay turned his head to her, and Zamasu could have sworn he caught his eye twitched while he did so. "You over here tryna be a peacemaker and shit." He smirked and Rebecca scrunched her brows together at him.

He felt a tap on his shoulder, and Zamasu turned to Irene. She was holding a menu in her hand, letting him look over at it. His eyes went directly to the small pictures around the red menu. She gave him a smirk. "I'll get you a chocolate lava cake because I know you fucks with chocolate."

Zamasu looked down at her. He brought up a very important question. "If I do this for tonight, actually tolerate you and your friends, will you make an effort to _not_ irritate me everyday?"

"Technically I don't already, but I can't make any promises. Don't be so hasty, Cabbage Patch."

Again… with these stupid nicknames- where does she even pull these words out of?

"Okay so let's see." Adrian now had the little device in front of him, making out

his order precisely. "I'ma get this… this… and this-ohhh and _this_ -"

"And I'm eating up the whole store, fuck is you talking about." Jay's frown was supplemented with a smirk, and Adrian just gave him a side-eye. Jay was more of a 'New-Yorker' than every single one of them.

After Adrian had finished, Irene placed her order, which was a custom cake; vanilla bean with yellow cakes and graham cracker pie crust with a mocha frappe. She then handed it to Zamasu, who looked utterly confused, so she had to press on things in front of him a few times and scrolled down to show him what a lava cake looks like, and Zamasu's eyes widened. It was melted chocolate with what he assumed was some fluffy vanilla thingy on top, _maybe being here wasn't a bad idea at all_. The Kaioshin appetite wasn't really that big, so Zamasu did not require a lot of food to be sated. He scrolled up and looked over at the drinks.

"Why does my guy look like he's playing games on there?" Jay and the crew started to laugh at the way Zamasu was leaning over with a concentrated look on his face. He looked up at the laughing bunch and just narrowed his eyes, continuing his search.

Rebecca's phone vibrated, and she pulled it out of her phone, seeing that there was a message from someone: **'Are they all there?'.** She opened her messenger's box to the person who texted her. Rebecca had this habit of making nicknames for certain people for the sake of laughs or inside jokes, or just how she thought of the person, this particular male was Trump Card. Don't ask why.

 **Yea, they are. You outside?**

Trump Card: **I'm coming in. They are gonna be so surprised.**

"Rebecca, you didn't order yet. Whatchu doin'?" Irene pushed the device towards her, Zamasu was already finished, and she took it and made her choices.

"I just got a very important text." She had a huge smile on her face.

"What's good with you?" Adrian raised a brow at her, Jay looked in her direction and looked at Adrian, and Irene leaned back.

"Are you seeing someone, is that what it is, and you haven't told us?"

" _Ooooooh_." Adrian and Jay both mused in unison, Zamasu looked at Rebecca who was now adorning a smile that showed she had a surprise for them.

Someone was coming behind them…

Adrian, Jay and Rebecca glanced back and quickly went to Irene, who looked confused. "Why are you guys looking at me like that?"

"Because of your beautiful face."

Irene whipped around at the sound of the man's voice, and instantly she jumped up to hug him. "JAMES!"

Adrian clapped it out, and Rebecca laughed with him, but Zamasu's focus was on Jay. The Asian male had such a burning gaze at this James person, while James was kissing Irene's forehead. Zamasu took a look at James; the guy was tall, probably his height or taller, he had short brown hair and green eyes, and Zamasu could tell he had a way with women, minus the fact that perhaps he and Irene were fond of one another. He also had this air of confidence too, but it wasn't as toned down as Irene's or Adrian's; he could easily be arrogant. He watched as James looked between the group and when his eyes went to Jay, Jay's face completely changed into a warm smile.

Zamasu automatically did not like the duality in this Asian man's behavior, he slightly did the same thing to Rebecca, and _nobody_ here seemed to notice but him. Not only that, but he did it so perfectly; how could one go from a deep glare to a generous genuine smile? It even looked sincere; What is with this man?

"My son Adrian, what's good?" They dapped it up and James went to Jay and did the same. Zamasu noticed that out of all five of these individuals, Jay was the best at convey emotions secretly. That's what made him tricky; it seems like it would be a daring conundrum to figure out what Jay really thought of you unless if you pay close attention to his actions.

"Beckyyyy." James gave her a hug, but it wasn't as long and deep as the one he gave to Irene, which shows how he is towards his girlfriend. An admirable trait. "And- oh shit…" James looked at Zamasu, who looked at him and they both just kinda stared at each other for a good two seconds. James had his eyebrow raised all the way up his head, and Zamasu sighed.

"I am Zamasu. Nice to meet you." He raised his hand for him to shake and James took it in awe.

"How the fuck are you _green_? Who are you though?" He was shocked at Zamasu's you know… appearance, but Zamasu can sense a slight tinge of defense in his timbre especially when he asked who he was, and he assumed this was because he was sitting next to Irene. Humans and animals have a way of being territorial, and it was reasonable to be that way towards someone you care about.

"My guy is from Mars, fam." Jay snorted, and Zamasu shot Adrian a look. He raised his hands.

"I am not from Mars," should he even explain it right now? How is he going to do that without confusing this person? "I am from… a different planet." He lied, he was from a different realm but that's a whole other thing that he didn't feel like stating.

"We call him Wasabi."

"Irene, shut your mouth." Instantly, Zamasu swung her a glare. "Just call me by my name, do not listen to her."

"Why not?" she looked at the Kaioshin, who gave her the obvious look of why she shouldn't refer to him as Wasabi. He didn't know what it was, but he didn't like it because it came from her.

"Because I said so."

"You're not the boss of me." Irene taunted. "You're not my dad."

James looked at his girlfriend. "But _I'm_ your daddy."

Adrian and Rebecca instantly busted out laughing, and Jay just chuckled. Zamasu raised a brow. He was about to voice his inquiry, but decided not to because he had a feeling that it was redundant. Irene on the other hand rolled her eyes with a smirk. "Just order your food, you idiot."

James sat next to Irene, so now it was Irene in between Zamasu and James, and Adrian was now in front of Zamasu. He placed his order, and now they had to wait until their giant mass of icey goodness would come forth to their table.

"How come you're back early?" Adrian sat up, and took off his bomber jacket.

James settled in. "Well, my game had ended, we won the event by the way," he added that part in, "Annnd I kinda had nothing else to do. We actually were able to leave like a few days prior to today, and I spent all that time sleeping." He reached over and placed his arm over Irene's shoulder. "And also because I lowkey missed my girl."

"Bitch, you better high-key miss me." Irene looked up at him and gave him a kiss on his chin.

Rebecca smiled. "You two are adorable, I swear."

"Why'd you have to add that you won though?" Adrian raised his brow, and James looked at him.

"Remember when you said 'Hey bro I'ma be at your game, you gon see me in the front row', and then when I walked out in the field, you weren't there you piece of shit?" Their playful attitude showed that they were all close knitted enough to curse at each other like this. "So that's how I know you don't watch my games."

"Hey listen…" Adrian raised his hand in his trademark 'I'm-finna-justify-my-actions-right-now' gesture. "I watch all your games, _that I'm in._ "

Jay laughed. " _Assssshole alerrrrt._ "

"Exactly. You weren't there for me." James had a mock-emotional timbre as he looked at his friend.

"How you gon put me out like that?" Adrian looked at both Jay and James. "But Jay bitchass never goes to your shit and you don't say anything about it?"

"Fam, I don't watch sports." Jay narrowed his eyes at him. "You already know this, you retard!" He gave Adrian a dunce on his head.

"How are you guys roommates and you don't even know that, Adri?" Rebecca side-eyed him.

"Shushhhhhh, we don't talk about this."

Zamasu looked around and just now noticed that they were the only ones inside of the shop. It is still the evening right now, why isn't there anyone in here?

"Zamasu."

He looked at Irene. "What?"

"You look mad confused." She had her phone in her lap.

He decided to voice his inquiry this time. "Why are we the only ones here?"

Jay sat up in his seat. "All of us are very famous people, bro. Most of us are well known by a whole lot of people. So because of that, restaurants gotta be emptied sometimes so that fans won't bombard us."

Adrian's eyebrow quirked up knowingly when Jay said _most_ , but he didn't voice anything on that. "They barely ever do anyway."

"...True but still, it's just in case."

That made sense, it probably would have been annoying had they had a lot people especially for him; a bunch of humans in one space would make his eye twitch more times than he's scowled in the past week. Especially if one of them associates him with food and action figures.

"What are your occupations?" He was actually relatively interested in what they did to earn such status.

"Well, me and Jay are music producers." He pointed to his sidekick.

"-And musicians, too. We can play a bunch of instruments." Jay added that in. "We mostly do EDM, but we've co-written and co-produced in other genres and stuff."

It wasn't that Jay was dismissive about his career, but the two were so comfortable and casual about their stature that they felt no need to brag about it.

"I'm an artist, you probably could tell from all the work hanging on my walls." Irene said, and Zamasu did spent some time looking and wandering around the house. Those paintings on the wall were amazing, some of them unique and it fit the modest feel of her house. But that's something he won't tell her obviously because he hated her. We all know that by now.

"I'm a basketball player." James raised his hand, green eyes looking at Zamasu. "Pro-league."

" _Surprisingly._ " Jay muttered under his breath with a shitty grin, and James rolled his eyes at the playful taunt. Zamasu smirked at the badger of the two, he noticed Jay's grin had a tint of another vibe in it for mere milliseconds, while everyone else didn't. This man was _great_ at hiding his emotions.

"I am a doctor." Rebecca looked at him, and Zamasu knew that she was more tolerable than Irene and her friends. He was right, being a doctor required you to be formal and less casual with everything. Even in her posture he could see that he could hold an intelligent conversation with her without wanting to punch her in the face. "Most of my job is in the medical field now. I am working in one of the best hospitals."

 _That last part was unneeded_ , but Jay didn't mention anything. He kept his sentiment to himself, because it would be really petty to say so. The Asian male pulled back his long hair and made a loose slip knot because this was one of those very rare days where he didn't have a hair band on him. His hair was long enough to do that anyway. Irene looked past Adrian and her eyes lit up.

"Oooh, there's our food- wait there's like three people coming." It was true; three guys were coming in with two trays in each hand.

"Who the hell ordered apple pie filling with chocolate ice cream?" Jay was already judging somebody's choice.

Rebecca nudged his arm. "That's mine. Don't judge me." They placed down the three trays in the center of their table. There were literally two trays there solely Adrian and Jay's food, and Zamasu's only lava cake.

He took it in his hands removing it from the tray and placing it in front of him. A silver fork was placed on the side of the plate by Irene and she gave him a knowing smile. He just glared at her. It was a chocolate cake with whip cream on top, and drizzled on elegantly was chocolate syrup. There were little chocolate pieces that littered around the cake itself for aesthetics. The fork in his hand, he took a piece of the cake, noting how soft it was and how it succumbed easily to his fork. Zamasu pulled the piece from the cake- _oh Kami what is that…_ The cake literally had melted chocolate oozing out of the inside. Zamasu's eyes widened, wondrously watching this melted chocolate make contact with the plate, and a big part of him knew he was going to enjoy this to the fullest.

 _Just don't… eat like a slob. Just take your time… take your time and don't eat too fas-_

" _Goddamn,_ Zamasu you good?" Jay's eyes were wide as he watched the Kaioshin literally take a bite and his eyes rolled as they closed. "Did you just bust one?"

Adrian instantly slapped Jay's arm. "Of all the analogies you could make, _that's_ the one you choose." Zamasu didn't know what that meant but he didn't want to ask.

"You know this guy ate like four chocolate bars outta my cabinet, right?"

Of course, _once again,_ Irene's sentence went through his head like a truck and he turned to her with his trademark death glare. She simply put her hands on her hips. "You can't even clock me for that because you know it's true."

She wasn't _wrong_.

"This is your first time being here?" Adrian looked to him, and Zamasu nodded. "Irene, I suggest you buy like five things of chocolate ice cream. This guy looks like he's fiending to devour the _entire plate_." Zamasu narrowed his eyes, and Irene nudged his shoulder, so that look turned into a glare at her.

"Next time you look at me like that, I'm hiding all the chocolate away from you for good."

She had a playful attitude, but Zamasu wasn't playing any games with her because he didn't like her. "I'll have no problem finding it anyway."

"Are you sure about that?"

"I'm very sure."

"You might get lost looking in all the cabinets of my house, Lettuce."

"You keep talking to me like that, and I will end you."

"Is that a threat?"

"That is a _promise_."

"Aight, bet."

"You think I'm joking?" They were now face-to-face with each other, and Jay literally had to stand up and push their shoulders so they would move away from one another. Adrian held his hand out in a 'time-out' gesture.

"James, come get your girl. I don't wanna see a fight in an ice cream parlor." Adrian motioned to Irene.

 _A fight that she would definitely lose_ , Zamasu sat up straight again, adjusting his v-neck shirt and Irene leaned back into her boyfriend's arm. She's always starting something with him, always trying to edge him on and make him get _dangerously_ close to killing her. Luckily, because of Jay and Adrian, and the amount of witnesses, and also what Gowasu would say to him, he refrained from violence at all costs. But it is harder than he thought it would be.

No, it wasn't his fault. No, he wasn't acting irrational. No, he wasn't lying about not acting irrational.

James leaned over to look at Zamasu. Again, he can sense the territorial vibe that the man was giving off. It wasn't a problem at all. "Do you guys always do this?"

"They do. Every single day." Rebecca said, then sipped her frozen yogurt.

Okay how did she know about whatever happens between Irene and he- _they're best friends. Of course this woman would run her mouth meaninglessly with her._ He was now sitting quietly, and angrily, but the taste of his lava cake diluted his anger to mere irritation.

"They just bicker and anger each other, and then back off one another for a long time." Rebecca smiled at it because it sounded ridiculous. Jay on the other hand raised his eyebrow at the woman. He was sitting here trying to enjoy a small cold meal… okay, not really small, but a reasonably sized meal, not hear tea about a woman and a green dude. Rebecca had a thing for saying a little too much at unnecessary times; there were several instances where he'd get something out of what she said, and knew it wasn't supposed to be uttered out loud, but the way she would word it wouldn't make anyone else give her a look. And she was smart for that; but that's what you get for being a doctor; wording things without really giving them a meaning, and that's why he was skeptical around her. How could anyone, but Adrian, not see this?

Maybe he needed to _cut back on the salt_ , it's been getting worse every time he sees her face.

"Jay."

He felt a small tap on his shoulder, and he turned to the person who tapped him. Adrian spoke low enough for only Jay to hear him. "You good?"

"I'm fine, I'm just… thinking." He flicked his eyes to the person who brushed through his mind and Adrian immediately picked it up.

"Listen, eat your shit and stop 'thinking' then." He smirked at his sidekick, Jay had no intention to fill his mind up with worthless things.

Oooh, that was a lie…

 _Oooh, that was shade…_

 _I'ma just eat my damn ice cream now._

The rest of the evening was actually well, Zamasu got a chance to speak with every single one of the young adults, he found himself speaking to Rebecca more often. She had a lot of knowledge in the medical field, so while everyone else was chattering aimlessly, he and her would talk about medicinal things. Of course, both of them had a scholar-like mentality, and he was surprised to learn that she also wasn't strictly attached to man-made medicines. She had a lot of knowledge in natural medicinal treatments, like herbs and certain types of fruits and vegetables. Perhaps he's found someone who's at _least_ amicab-

 _Zamasu, you're losing your grip. These are mere disgusting humans, they have no respect for their beautiful planets, nor do they respect themselves. Such a pitiful race._

It's probably due to the lava cake, isn't it? That's what's making him so weak, it's soft cake surface, and melted chocolate glazed heavily over the top of his fork along with the whip cream and drizzled chocolate syrup on top. No, no… he will _not_ succumb to this delicious treat, at all…

Mainly because that was his last piece, and he finished it all. But hey, that means there's no more foods to weaken him for the rest of the night.

Everyone had finished their food, were chatting away, and we won't act like Irene hadn't caught the fact that Zamasu was actually _talking_ to her best friend. She was literally taken aback, but didn't say anything, she just marveled at the moment. But a little part of her wondered why that was because she and Rebecca were nearly the same person. But Zamasu hated her guts, and that shit ran deep with him in less than 24 hours after meeting him.

Even though she wouldn't show it, sometimes she does get scared at how just… _Angry_ he gets when she even looks in his direction. Speaking to him was like walking through a plank bridge with spikes at the bottom, it just so happens that she's been keep her balance so far.

 _So far_.

He hasn't even given her a pissed off stank face ass look, it was surprising coming from a god with homicidal tendencies.

"It's 8 _already_?"

Jay was looking at the time on his phone in shock, and pretty much everyone followed suit with him. They didn't even know that time had passed this quick. She looked at him; he was kind of cute with his hair in a loose ponytail. And Adrian looked attractive in that bomber jacket and raised ponytail of his. It's surprising how these two don't ever have bromances-

Wait, that is a lie. 90 percent of their friendship is basically bromance. She still shipped them though.

"I think it's time for just to go, even though we could stay for as long as we wa-"

Instantly Jay puts his hand on Adrian's mouth. "We have to go because we're gonna be busy."

Adrian gave him a look, and grabbed his hand off his lips. "You're just saying that because you wanna go home and sleep."

Jay whipped his head to him and pointed at him. "THAT IS… NOT FALSE." See? This is why Irene shipped the two of them.

"Why are you so adamant on leaving?" Rebecca looked up at him, and Jay was too busy putting his cups and plates together to face her. It was a habit of his; cleaning up after himself whenever they ate out.

"I have important things to do-"

"SLEEP." Adrian yelled out and instantly risked a slap on his shoulder.

"Wooooooow." Rebecca pursed her lips and shook her head. "Shouldn't you be a little happy to see all of us again?"

"I am happy to see my friends again, but I'm tiiiired." Obviously, Adrian was the only one, and maybe even Zamasu, who caught the shade in Jay's movements. But the Asian male supplemented it with a mock-complaint statement, you know, to keep the shade at _bay_.

"You know what? I think we could wrap it up. Babe?" James looked to his girlfriend, and she told him she already drove here in the first place. They all stood up, and threw down all their due cash once the check came in, plus a $100 tip. Do not ask why.

Zamasu got up and out of his seat. He adjusted his clothing again, because he wasn't used to being just so… casual. It's so weird, how do they do it on a daily basis? In lieu of him looking down and straightening his shirt, he saw a pair of black shoes in front of him, and so he looked up to see that it was Rebecca.

"It was nice to meet you finally, Zamasu." She raised her hand to shake; he noted how formal her arm gesture was compared to the weird slap thing that Irene and Adrian did. So he shook her hand, she had really soft and small hands.

"It was nice to meet you, too." He nodded.

Irene watched the two from afar; if Zamasu can get along with Rebecca, then he could definitely get along with Jay and Adrian. It'll just take some time, so far it's been a good month since he came, and it looks like things are getting better with him. Maybe he won't be a sour prick when she drives him home, and call it a night.

 _Maybe._

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **I know Irene's struggle with natural hair. It's a beautiful pain in the ass xD.**

 **So now, Zamasu got a little 'taste' of her friends. Looks like he's already holding shady sentiments with one of them. Lemme just say right now, I want you guys to pay close attention to a few things; James' name on Rebecca's phone, Jay's shady attitude, the seating arrangement of Irene, Zamasu and James, Zamasu's description of each person… do not let these things go past your head. They will all be played out in this story.**


	7. Open Doors

**Okay, compared to the last chapter, this one is actually shorter.**

 _ **Actually.**_

 **And someone in the review asked if Goku Black would be in this fanfic. I'll clarify it right now (I actually should have left this on the first chapter) this happened BEFORE Mr. Z met Goku. So there will be no Goku Black in this story. Gowasu's really seemingly redundant task put upon Zamasu actually serves a purpose and that purpose is what he and you guys will learn as the story goes. This will also be posted in the DragonBall Super category thingy (but does that mean I gotta copy and reupload this completely? Please let me know if any of you may).**

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 **Open Doors**

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They got home that night. Zamasu didn't say anything, he was silent, he went straight upstairs. He went into that large bathroom and took a quick shower, Irene had to show him how to use it beforehand, and he stayed silent the whole time. He stayed silent in the shower, he stayed silent, when he got out, he stayed silent when he reached his room in nothing more than a towel.

But he groaned extra loud when he finally plopped down on his bed.

He ran his fingers through his gray mohawk, and sighed; he spent three hours outside of her house and with other people. Three hours doing so amazingly well at not wanting to crush skulls and crush them all to the depths of a fiery, scalding pit. Three whole hours of constant chattering (the only relatively good thing was that lava cake, which he still won't admit is something he kind of wanted right now), and three whole hours having to sit next to that wretched woman who pulled him into such an annoying conglomerate. _Three. Damned. Hours._ Wasn't this a feat?

It should be.

So he wore his underclothing of his uniform, this time he didn't wear the armor as well, and went downstairs and back to his most tolerable spot of her house: the backyard, the open field of greenery and cool, calm wind. And he laid in the grass, and then he closed his eyes and cleared his mind. And then he inhaled, and then exhaled, doing his best to completely forget about what he had to go through in the evening.

That was nearly two weeks ago. Right now, it was in the morning, and Zamasu was still laying in the grass with his eyes closed, his white mohawk blew softly in the breeze. He looked pristine, peaceful and tranquil, like an individual who didn't think about wanting to make an entire species spontaneously combust with his willpower. He wasn't sleeping, gods and their apprentices don't sleep-

Okay, no they _do_ , but like… they do it solely whenever they wanted to. They don't need it as much as their flawed two-legged duo-hemisphere nutcase brained creations did.

Clearly, he was in a meditative state. As a Kaioshin, sitting and ruminating was very common, aside from reading a whole lot and being vigilant supervisors, some of them reach that stature. So you could say that peace and intelligence were two main rivets to the Kaioshin race, and the ones who are to supervise are the ones with the greatest peak of those two aspects completely. They are the ones who have mastered the balance between knowledge and tranquility. And here's where you might be thinking how the blue turtle shell heck do those even go together?

Well, think of it like this. When you know much of a thing, you'll find the need to tell and expel that information wherever you go. And if it's something that makes you feel some type of way, you may act out on that information. Start to learn a whole lot about something that is hugely conflicting, and you'll find that you'll feel annoyed by it, and then angry towards it, and in time it might turn into hate, and then you might start acting on that hate. Then you find, after reflecting on your behavior, that you have learned nothing while being so spiteful because you were running on nothing but emotion. What you learned may have changed over time, but your emotions towards it haven't, then you'll have a whole lot of ground to cover at that point. And maybe a lot of facepalming at the stuff you've missed while flailing your arms and rolling your eyes in irritation.

Being emotionally attached to something that is flawed causes you to distort your perception of that being, to the point where everything becomes skewed into your own judgement rather than being seen in a non-judgemental way. Judging is what keeps you away from peace in the first place.

So then why did this green Shinjin apprentice that's laying on this planet's grass seek peace all the while not looking at humans from a non-judgemental point of view? And why did he not take into account that knowledge and peace should come together respectively, and not subjectively? Was that the one thing he wasn't seeming to get, was it attachment that he need to get rid of in order to see and accept human beings for their horrid imperfections? If he didn't care, if he wasn't attached to them, why did he hate them in the first place, and why did he choose to continue hating them until now?

Those questions were not posed by him and his thoughts. They were posed by the author.

He opened his eyes, pupils contracted from the introduced sunlight, he felt calm and at ease again. Green hands unraveled from underneath his head, and he propped himself up on his elbows. His earrings swayed slightly with his white hair, and now he fully sat up. It was a rare sight to see Zamasu not fully wearing his uniform, complete with the armor and everything. It was even rarer to see him smile at the beauty of the sky while he was on Desna.

On a piece of land that belonged to someone he hated so much.

He cracked his neck, stood up, stretched, and turned to the kitchen door. He needed to get a book to read and pass time with, so he walked to the door and opened it a took a step in. Immediately, he was met with delicious aromas that nearly made his nose flare, and a certain someone jumping, dancing and skipping around the kitchen while making breakfast. Irene had a pair of black leggings on with an oversized blue T-shirt, her hair was wild and free, and she was now holding the spatula like it was a microphone. She literally spun around, and stopped completely in the most awkward position when she made eye contact with the Kaioshin leaning against her kitchen door.

His eyebrow had never been so far up his forehead in a long time.

Irene rightened her position, took off her earbuds, looking down at the counter while doing so. Then she looked back at his _What the hell are you doing_ face. "Good moriiiiiiing."

Zamasu frowned, and opened his mouth like he wanted to say something, but then stopped and just sighed. He stepped completely into her house and closed her door, he didn't face her. "What is wrong with you?"

She giggled. "I was just dancing, you never seen't anyone dance before?"  
" _That_ was dancing?" It wasn't like she was bad at it at all, whatever she did just looked ugly to him.

"Like you could even dance." She stuck her face at him with her hands on her hips.

"You shouldn't be talking to me with such attitude." He looked her up and down in annoyance.

"You sound like my mom right now. And last time I checked, you weren't the one raising me."

"She did a terrible job at that."

He was surprised that she didn't rebuke as fast because she was relatively taken aback at how blunt his claim was. She knew damn well that she was raised in a well family, so there was no need to get upset at what he said. " _Sure thing_ she did, your Honor."

One day, she might just get punched in the face for being so sarcastic all the time. One day, she might just get slapped for not taking him seriously. That last part is bound to happen. He went to where the bookshelves were to get a random book, and was about to go back outside when a particular thought ran through his mind.

 _That smells really good._

No, no, no, he did not need food to survive, and he definitely did not want to eat anything made by her right now. Even though he may have had waffles that she prepared for him, but that was before, and right now she just pissed him off greatly.

 _But the smell… it's almost divine..._

Made by a young woman who couldn't keep her trap shut clean, who apparently is having a hard time comprehending just how strong he was, and who really _really_ is in need of being strangled. Irene had not an ounce of respect for him nor did he think she'd respect herself at all, since she has the nerve to speak so brashly to someone who literally could impale her without even trying. So why the heck would he even want to eat whatever she was making? She was horrible, disgusting, and whatever she did was just as horrible and disgusting as she purely is. Why would he waste his time wanting to eat from a lowly being like her-

"What is in that pot?"

In what type of world would you live in where your spoken words completely opposed whatever you were thinking _right on the spot_?

She leaned against the counter, looking over in the direction of the dining room. She smiled. "Umm, that right there is gonna be some hashbrowns and the scones are…" a soft 'ding' noise went off and Irene's eyes lit up, "done right now." She pulled out a pie pan from the oven, and the fresh scent of vanilla hit Zamasu's nose like a truck. She started to cut the little pie into equal triangle pieces. He took a deep breath; he won't put his mouth near that.

She then grabbed this little bottle with a tiny nozzle, it had some sort of white sauce in it, and she started drizzling that icing onto the scones and Zamasu's eyes followed the icing's drippy consistency, it flowed down the soft, tender scones perfectly. He swallowed.

"And the hashbrowns are done." She opened the pot, and the initial scent that he was introduced to was amplified by like tenfold, and now his mouth was kind of watering. She placed all of the food onto the kitchen counter, since the only people who will be eating are her and hi-

NO, NO, he will not eat any of her food. She pissed him off, she angered him, he will not eat from her hand. At all. "Zamasu."

He blinked at her.

"Aren't you hungry? Come sit and eat before you go outside again."

Temptation… it was tempting to sit there and ingest all of that good food that was sitting there, fresh and hot, beckoning and teasing his and his tastebuds. "I'm not hungry. I don't need food."

"You don't need it, but you know you _waaaaant_ it, my boy." She went to him and took his wrist and he instantly snatched it from her.

"What are you doing?"

"I know you want to eat, come and sit." She crossed her arms, and he scoffed.

"You have the nerve to speak to me so belligerently, and now you think I am going to eat your food?"

She sighed. "Okay, take it as my apology then. But if you don't want to eat then I guess I'll have all of this delicious goodness all for myself." She skipped back to the counter, pulling out her plate.

And then he broke. "You humans with your selfish behavior! You won't _dare_ to eat all of that in my presence, you wench!" He literally stomped over to where she was and demanded a plate. She laughed, but still took out a plate, however she didn't hand it to him. She put it in front of his seat, along with a fork and a knife, and he narrowed his eyes at her.

"I'ma serve you."

"No you're not."

"Why not?"

"I don't trust you."

She frowned. "Bro, I served you the last time."  
"I have a name, you know." He shouldn't have said that, because what she said next made his eye twitch.

"Okay, Zama- _choo_ , I served you before. Why are you not letting me?"

"I already told you why."

She still was holding the serving spatula in her hand making her way to the hashbrowns. "I'm not gonna butcher my own food because you're eating too. I'm not that petty-" She took a slice of a hash, and raised a hand at Zamasu's threatening glare. "It's for _me_ , for fucks sake."

Zamasu walked over and took the spatula out of her hand when she was done, so that way she wouldn't play games with him before he wanted to eat. He served himself, sat down, and took a nice little bit-

 _By the Gods, how does this taste so amazing?_

"I can see that you like it."

His eye twitched, she was speaking again. She was speaking again, and it ruined the savorous moment that he just had. If only he had the generosity to actually say that her cooking was nice, but he did because humans are ugly creatures. So he didn't say anything, he just glared at her and continued eating. They both stayed that way, in silence, no party initiating anything, luckily for Zamasu.

Irene shifted in her seat. She was more than lucky to have enough culinary smarts to make amazing food, and not take to waste money on takeouts and junk. That's the perks of being raised in a first-generation family, matter of fact just about in any cultured family in general; she shared that aspect with Jay, he could make a _mean_ ass bowl of ramen noodles. Adrian on the other hand, was actually really good with pastries. He is likely more husband material since he could make his own meals; and Jay could be, but he literally is the antithesis of settling down. Rebecca wasn't that good of a cook, but Irene has been teaching her a few things here and there. It isn't enough for Rebecca to almost accidentally burn Irene's kitchen mat, but she's getting there by baby steps. The kitchen mat thing actually happened, they were teenagers, but we aren't going to talk about that.

She leaned forward, suddenly reminded of her uterus' painful 7-day long _coup d'etat_. A tiny noise escaped her lips, it made the Kaioshin across from her flick his eyes in her direction.

"Cramps." Was the simple answer to the unspoken question that he probably wasn't even asking in the first place.

Zamasu looked down at his plate, which was technically empty if you can call it that of course, and then he looked at the rest of the hashbrowns. His eyes flicked back to his plate and then at the wonderfully steamy tray of still-hunting hashbrowns.

You know, he didn't resist it the first time. But it's always better to dust yourself off and just _try again_ , right?

"You can get some more if you want, you know."

Grey, irritated eyes went to the blinking black woman on the other side of the table. "I don't want anymore."

"You're staring at it like you want to vacuum the entire shit. Just go up and get it, and stop being so petty."

Her playful attitude didn't go unnoticed by Zamasu, but he wasn't playing any games. He got up, walked to where she was sitting and looked at her real close. His grey eyes suddenly had this cutthroat (not literally) look, it was enough to actually make Irene put her fork down and shift away from him in her seat. _Quietly_ , of course. "Do you think you can talk like that to me, and walk away with both of your arms intact?"

His voice was _really_ low, Irene didn't think he could get angry at this, especially with all the 'transgressions' she kept making within the past month and a half. Of all the the names se's called him and he gets mad at this? _Maybe I could have worded it a bit differently_ \- no, she couldn't have. If she did, he probably wouldn't have reacted anyway.

" _I'm speaking to you, woman."_

You could _feel_ the heat and anger coming from this man's voice. Irene should tread carefully with this, because she didn't know if he was gonna hold himself at Bay, or if her eyeballs were going to end up gouged and thrown on the floor. "Zamasu," this was one of those rare moments where Irene was afraid, not of the way he came up on her primarily, but more on the _unpredictability_ of this situation. "I'm not trying to start anything here, okay. I am just saying that you can go get some more food over there. I am not gonna castigate you for it." She had a calm voice, and a calm demeanor, something told her that if she answered him in fear, he would have perpetuated the whole situation more than he did.

Instead, his eyes burned into her face, and then he took a deep breath, turned around and walked away.

Okay, low-key she was expecting him to scream into her ear for some reason. But it seems like he swallowed the _urge_ to do something physical to her, and with that deep breath she knew he would have given her the wettest work if he hadn't taken a moment to inhale. He now took his plate, placed it in the sink, and then went back outside, surprisingly he actually closed the door softly.

And that alone was what scared her the most. He had that anger bottled up within him and it didn't even look like it was all on her. It was more like all the anger he felt towards her species _all in one sentence_ , weighed completely with malice and disdain. In case if y'all hadn't known, that's _thousands of years_ of anger. Obviously, she probably now should tone down the jokes and playful attitude with this guy…

...And maybe wait about a week or more to do the shit again. Yep, that sounds reasonable.

x¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤x

Jay was a nice guy.

Jay was diligent; he'd spend many hours in the studio trying to get one little thing perfect. He'd turn knobs, slide modulators, input synths and melodies, listen to it once, twice, _twenty_ times, and then do the whole thing again. And again. And again. He's done this for eight years now, four of which were of professional status.

But he was going through one of those weird phases; the 'ADHD musical prolapse'. I promise you, the name could have been better if it wasn't described the way that it is going to be. He would find a sound, put it in, like it, and then tweak it and make another sound, and then he'll like that to the point where he'd completely lose track of what the song was supposed to feel like.

Adrian walked in the studio at one point, and back pedaled out of the room because Jay, in his disheveled, baggy eyed slouched stature, turned down with the most evil look on his face. And it was by accident too, he spent a few hours working on one single track.

By a few hours, about almost three days.

Technically two days and about… 14 hours. It's not that much.

Jay ruffled his hair for the umpteenth time since he had started. His stomach was growling loudly; he hadn't eaten since this morning, which was around 7 in the morning, and it's 8 at night now. He only had a breakfast burrito and two bananas, but now he was too lazy to stop doing his line of work to get up and get himself something to eat. You see how that is hugely contradictory? How can one be too lazy to get something to eat?

That kind of logic works when you spend 62 hours wide awake suffering from musician's block.

His phone rang, and he nearly jumped out of his seat and busted his ass on the floor. Already stressed and pissed, he pursed his lips and grabbed his phone, he closed his eyes before he could look at the caller ID, and took a really deep breath. Mainly because whoever just called him was about to get cut and cursed out and you really don't want Jay of all people cursing you out at 8PM. He opened his eyes and out the phone to his ear, literally about to grit his teeth but he kept his composure.

" _Who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want_?"

Almost kept most of his composure.

"Bruh, you didn't look at who was calling first?" It was Adrian. Instantly, his angry demeanor went back down a little bit because of his sidekick's playful voice.

"Oh…" That's all he could say. That's all you could say when you're tired and stressed.

Adrian laughed on the other end. "You're still in the studio? You haven't ate in mad long and that's fucking surprising."

"Shut up, I have ate something before." Jay ran his hands through his hair, and got it stuck where a hair band was tied loosely on the back. He pulled it off quick as hell because that was going to get him stressed too.

" _Yeah,_ bullshit. When did you eat?"

"Like… not long ago." Tired people usually suck at lying by default, to be honest.

"A.K.A this morning?" The intonation this guy had was as if he asked a question that he already knew the answer to.

Jay scratched the back of his head, and spoke in the meekest voice possible. "Umm… yea."

And then he laughed again. And then Jay's stomach growled louder and it made Adrian stop laughing. "Dude I can hear your shit on the phone, fam. Look, I went out and got some food for you and me."

He sat up. "What is the food?"

Adrian snorted, and Jay made a note to throw something at him when he returns for poking fun at his sudden shitty English. "It's uhh… from two different places. Two pizzas and a thing of seafood from Yang's, there's sushi in there."

Yang's is Jay's to-go spot for authentic Asian cuisine. You'll never find someone who puts as much emphasis on Asian food as Jay, being that he's been to several countries in Asia already, and he _is_ Asian too.

"Oh shit, thanks bro."

"No problem, fam." Jay smiled even though Adrian wasn't there. The one thing that he truly needed the most was food; his stomach growling disrespectfully for the past hour and the lack of sleep causes him to become irrational. Luckily, that trait hasn't been exhibited because he's been in this room for hours. At least he can eat while working on this piece.

"But when I get home, yo ass better come the fuck downstairs and eat in the dining room, I don't want to bring my food and have you take it into the studio."

 _Nevermiiiiiiind…_ He kissed his teeth and pouted. "Do I look like your fucking wife? Let me eat where I wanna eat in peace."

"I know that I come through with the food, you'll take it upstairs and you wouldn't even eat it completely so stay your ass downstairs." Adrian was actually irritated at the way Jay would work and completely forget his basic human needs. He really wanted his friend to eat something, because Adrian didn't want Jay jeopardizing his health, and mostly because Jay would lose his temper very easily with almost everything that _didn't_ have to do with producing.

"I'm gonna eat, don't worr-"

"Down. The fuck. Stairs." _He ain't playing no games_. It was better to oblige, Jay didn't want to be picked up and thrown onto the sofa again.

" _Fiiiiine._ Can I hang up now?" he asked that because he obviously agreed to something that he didn't really want to do, but hey, it's _food_. And for him, it's _free_.

"Well you _can_. But I really want you to get off and relax for a minute before I return."

He said a minute, so that means Jay could sit here and work until Adrian is a minute away. He may not know where he is but a minute is only 60 seconds, that's not a lot of time.

"I will, I will. You don't need to baby me all the time."

"This is one of those rare times where you literally forget that food exists."

He's not _wrong_. "Okay fine! I'll just chill downstairs until you come by." No, he'll continue working until the doorbell rings and then he'll run to open it and sit down on the couch as if he was there ever since the call started. Sounds like a sweet, productive plan, and Jay was more than stoked to get his not-really-final touches on this track.

And then the doorbell rang.

 _What an asshole._

So Jay groaned like a dying man and stood up lazily, instantly bending over because of the sudden stretch in his legs. He had this hunched over walk while he was going down the stairs, while he was semi-walking through the living room, and while he was opening the door. And sure enough, Adrian's smug stupid smile ass face was there.

"...Heyyyyyyyy…" Jay stood straight this time, and then leaned forward a bit. He literally tried to sprint to the door, and now it was giving him a tiny bit of vertigo.

"You see, I told your ass to lay off the damn- dude are you okay?" He walked in and popped the question as soon as he noticed Jay couldn't stay still and was swaying like he was drunk. Okay, maybe it was giving him a _lot_ of vertigo. Now Adrian was holding Jay's shoulder.

"I'm okay, for fucks sake. Let go of me." His eyes went straight to the food, which Adrian was holding the pizza tray and the box of Himuran seafood in one hand. His reaction was super animated, he literally came up on Adrian and grabbed the food from him with _specialized care._ "Hold that with both your hands! You're gonna drop everything!"

"Bro I have better grip on anything right now compared to your pseudo-drunk ass." Of course, Jay now had that dramatic gait of a disgruntled teenaged girl. He passed the living room and went to the dining room, placing the food on the tray while looking back every few seconds. Then he took the box of seafood, looking at it's contents and savoring the beautiful aesthetic that his favorite restaurant always came correct with. To be honest, anything looks pretty when you've been staring at plugins, oscillators and pattern sequences for hours. His hands glazed over the top, then he turned around and made a beeline for the stairs.

Unfortunately, his dick-headedly concerned friend grabbed him before he could even get a foot halfway through the living room, god dammit.

"Where do you think you're going? You're staying down _here_ and eating your shit."

Jay blinked. Now his long tousled hair was all over the place and Adrian's arm was in his face because apparently you can't catch someone without picking them up sideways. "You're lucky I didn't have the food in my hands otherwise I woulda' clipped your ass." This is how you know Jay is tired; if he's in a physically stuck situation, he would usually be calm and methodical in trying to get out. Right now, he's thrashing sideways in Adrian's strong arms low-key knowing he can't get out. Finally he got tired, if that's even possible, and just groaned. " _Let go of me, you fuck._ "

"Okay, okay I will, geez." He released him, like Jay said, and Jay fell on the floor. Simultaneously Adrian backed away a good ten feet from possibly getting an uppercut to his groin. "Why were you running upstairs for?"

"I have to _change_ because I look-" _And feel_ , "Like utter _shit_."

"Uh huh." Adrian knew Jay very well. Jay couldn't give two shits while he walked around the house in boxers. His appearance at home means nothing at all. "Are the studio lights still on?"

Jay was a great liar, but he's too tired to come up with a rebuttal so he settled for the easiest lie that there was. " _No."_

"Bullshit." Adrian started up the stairs and Jay got up so fast that his vertigo got even worse and he ended up falling on Adrian's back.

"...Can you let go of my shirt?"

"I will if you turn the fuck around, and walk the fuck back in the fucking dining room." Another thing; even though Jay swears, he doesn't swear excessively when he's not tired.

"Look if you're _still_ working on that track, then save it, and work on it tomorrow. You haven't slept since Tuesday."

"So?! That's fucking nothi- wait…What day is it today?"

"It's Thursday."

Jay went silent, blinked and was about to rebuke and say 'that's not that much' but Adrian cut him off, took him by the arms and walked him to the couch. He sat him down. "Stay the fuck here. I'll go save your project and then turn it off."

"But why can't I do it?" It's as if he was a little kid being scolded, and surprisingly enough Adrian is the least mature out of the two of them. _Such a weird dynamic_.

"You say you're gonna leave it now, and then you'll say you're gonna leave it six hours later."

It took him a moment to get that because he was far too fucking tired to understand anything other than basic English. "Well…" he was right. Jay deflated. "Fine, go… turn... it off…" he literally yawned _twice_ in between _one_ word. Adrian didn't even stay to hear him finish his sentence, he just went off and did what he said he would. When Adrian came back, he changed into a pair of sweats and still kept his V-neck shirt on because why not. "Come on, let's go eat."

Jay looked at him, his hair was so messy it looked like he just came out of bed. The very thought of his bed made him yawn again. "Okay…" losing all the energy to fight back, he stood halfway, and then fell back on the seat. Adrian just shook his head.

"This is what happens when you don't _sleep for three days_."

"It was less than three." He raised his finger matter-of-factly, and then stretched.

"Whatever, same difference. Now let's goooo." Adrian went to go pick the Asian male up and he sunk back into the couch.

"No, no, you go eat. I'm too tired to... move and things." Jay seriously couldn't get up on his own. If he sat in the dining room, he will end up face first on the table. But of course, Adrian being the asshole caring friend that he is, picks Jay up and puts him across from where he would be sitting. When he was placed down, Jay almost placed his head on the table but he kept his posture straight just to keep from sleeping. He slowly opened his box while Adrian was in the kitchen doing something.

"Oh nooo… chopstiiiicks." Jay swiveled lazily in his seat and made a tired grabbing motion. "Can you pass me my chopsticks?"

Adrian looked at him. Their kitchen was pretty big, it was connected to the dining room so Adrian only had to turn his head to look at Jay. "Aight." He took Jay's black chopsticks that he got from China, and tossed them directly at the man.

"Are you deadass right now?" He only flinched and raised his hands in an attempt to catch it, but one ended up on his lap and the other hit his hand and landed on the table. Jay's reflexes were nearly non-existent right now, how in the hell did Adrian expect Jay to _catch_ anything, let alone two _freaking chopsticks_?

"You said to pass it." He approached him with that smirk on his face knowing that Jay couldn't catch them anyway, and Jay balled his fists.

"I feel like _duffing_ you, I swear."

"You can't even catch shit and you're gonna fight me?" Adrian chuckled and sat down to his slices of pizza, that were just heated from the micro-oven. "Sit up tired ass down and eat."

So Jay did, but it won't be long until he gets his fucking comeuppance, _that fucking bi-_ "Why do I have to eat? I'm tired, I can barely keep my eyes open."

Adrian looked up from taking a bite. " _Becaaaaauuuuse_ you can't sleep on an empty stomach."

Jay blinked. "But I've been awake on an empty stomach. It's not _that_ bad."

Adrian straight faced. "Yesterday, I walked in the studio and you threw your socks at me for making a joke."

The Asian male raised a brow. He did that? _I don't even remember that…_ "...I did?"

"Yes." He crossed his arm, holding the pizza in the other.

"But…" Jay finally ate one bit of sushi and paused just to revel at the amazing taste. He even almost forgot what he was saying. "But like… that was just a sock."

"You were gonna throw your keyboard at me too."

"What?!" He didn't even tell, his voice did this voice crack thing where it sounded like he was yelling but it was more like a croak. "Why the hell would I do that."

" _I don't fucking know_ , you were tired? Ask yourself that 24 hours ago, dunce."

"Eh, shush." Having no rebuttal for that, Jay went back to eating slowly. If he didn't do so, he more than likely would have caught vertigo and an impending stomachache from eating too fast. That makes a lot of sense. His thoughts, surprisingly kind of coherent, went back to the events that happened over the week. The last two days went by in a distorted blur, Monday was actually quiet, the two spent the day being children and playing video games, that night was where Jay started getting inspiration for this song. He called up Irene on Sunday just for the sake of it. The call was supposed to be less than a minute but it turned into forty five minutes of bullshitting around, and throughout the call Irene would be talking to Zamasu, and half the time the guy sounded like Jay would every morning on a school day.

He wasn't a morning person. At all. Even though he was a straight A student, he hated the heck out of the subjects he were put into. They were too overly-consistent; there wasn't anything hard about them, what makes it hard is the asston and-then-some of work that comes along with it.

He wasn't even that surprised; Irene gave Jay and the others a low-down on him through a group chat. Jay wasn't that judgemental, but the way he would dismiss Irene's taunting or whatever it was reminded him of how a teenager would disown whatever an elder would say, which was funny because apparently that Zamasu-guy is thousands of years old. Go figure.

Last Wednesday was tiring. Irene woke him up via text, and he was in the middle of an amazing freaking nap. You ever wake up with a bunch of lines on your face and arms from the pillows and sheets? Yes, _that_ kind of nap.

Honestly, despite the entire hangout being overall great, he didn't like being the one to sit next to Rebecca. If it weren't for Adrian being next to him too, he probably would have scooted all the way to the edge, no it's not mean. And if it were James sitting with him in between the two, Jay would have had his lips pursed the whole time. It's not mean.

He just doesn't like them. They always look a certain type of way, and Jay could spot sketchy people from a mile and a half. It's something you develop after being exposed to the rurals and the city throughout your life. Different people you meet give you various perspectives on others in general. And give you various perspectives on how patient jealousy can be.

Okay, okay, maybe it's just the lack of sleep, maybe it's his judgemental side kicking in, that's a little too much of a stretch. He can't just naturally say that Rebecca is jealous of her best friend like that, but the girl has something that just seems to be a little… _left_.

He was about take a sip of his water, but then ended up halfway missing his mouth and some of the water fell on his shirt.

"Fhuck." He couldn't even speak properly. All the energy that he could possibly have right now was gone from digesting his food, and thinking about the days beforehand. He felt a hand take his arm and tug his tired ass a bit.

"Okay, you're finished already, you can go sleep now." Adrian took his empty box and plopped it into the garbage, placing Jay's chopsticks in the sink. Jay on the other hand stretched again and yawned.

"Can you...help me?"

Adrian turned around, eyebrow raised. "What?"

"Carry meeee." Jay was too exhausted to stand, he make a grabbing motion with both his hands.

"...You serious?" Adrian was seriously asking, because Jay would never ask someone to do that for him. Yup, he was finished beyond belief. So Adrian went over and picked him up bridal style(because he was certain if he slung him over his shoulder, Jay would catch vertigo again), and made his way up the stairs to Jay's room. Once he reached the bed, he stopped caring so much about Jay's possible risk of vertigo, and just tossed him onto his bed.

The Asian male sat up, and reached for a book on his nightstand to throw at Adrian's nose bridge. Instead, it ended up a few feet away from him, and Jay gave up on trying to be an angry man, slumping back into the bed.

Adrian took off his shirt, deciding he'd wear a sweater because the air conditioner was on blast. They had an automated system where the air conditioner would turn on or off if the house reached a certain temperature. "I'm gonna go back downstairs and watch a movie. I better not see you wake up at 4 AM just to work on that track. I know you like to get things finished but please… I don't want you throwing my chair at me and then forgetting you did so several hours later, aight?" No response, just silence. Adrian turned. "Aight?"

Jay was already knocked out, deep asleep within a span of thirty seconds.

Adrian snorted, approaching the bed and pulling the blanket over him. He walked out of the room without a word, leaving Jay in his own world of unconsciousness, and leaving his shirt on Jay's floor.

†¦†¦†¦†¦†¦†¦†¦†¦†¦†

Another.

Damned.

Visitor.

It's almost every single week Irene calls up her friends, but this time Zamasu made a point earlier today to not mess with him. Unless if she wanted her insides spread across her beloved living room carpet.

He was now in his room laying on his bed, reading another one of the books from her shelf. The book itself was a collection of short stories, in which Zamasu found some being really funny and some being very suspenseful. The running theme in all of these stories, he noticed, was that the person, or people involved in each story, had some troubling issues about them. There was always something that he pinpointed a little off in their actions and dialogue, and for some reason most of these stories started and ended happily with the person not realizing their glaring flaws. Except for one particular story, where an old man was fearful and mostly anxious of everything; his past, his present, and his future. In essence, that fear and anxiety turned into nervousness which made him very easily irritated and ungrateful, until he went to a flower shop and was glancing all over at nature's beautiful and various hues. One particular flower caught his eye; an agrimony, which he bought from the store in a heartbeat. Every time he'd look at the agrimony he'd find himself to be more and more calm, and over time, he became more thankful of the world around him, and of everything that has happened to him, whether it be good or bad, because those events are what led him to live for so long. He started to exert kindness and peace everywhere he went, and realized that that was what made him feel the best.

Seeing the types of books in someone's house shows a lot about the person. If the books are academic, then the person has scholar tendencies, and if they're celebrity-like magazines, the person might have a tendency to gossip. Irene had a wide range of books, which shows that she's interested in a lot of things. Some books were dusty from not being touched, and they were either textbooks, or some old stories that he didn't look into yet.

He didn't want to go down because there were people he didn't know, and probably did not like downstairs, but he also was almost done with this book and didn't want to sit here unoccupied. So he now just sits here… _stuck_.

He heard footsteps coming upstairs and assumed they were Irene's. Zamasu didn't pay no mind to them until he realized they were coming closer to his room. He literally tensed up a bit, and the footsteps went passed his door. _Ugh…_

The last thing he wanted was another encounter by the stupid woman, he was growing tired of her idiocy, only a month and some time had passed and he was _really_ close to twisting her neck. A door opened outside of his room and he heard footsteps that came to a stop, and he could tell they weren't by the stairs.

Two knocks came from his door.

Zamasu inhaled deeply and he stood up and walked, or semi-stomped, to his door. Irene is going to get punched, he's going to open his door, and he won't even let her open her mouth, his fist will be lodged into her face. You know what, maybe her mouth should be open so that way when he punches her, there's a high possibility of her teeth falling out or ending up horribly crooked, and she'll never be able to speak again. That's sounds really, really nice.

His hand grabbed the knob and he turned it quickly, and then opened the door with his other hand in a fist. She won't bother him this time, she will leave him alo-

"Oh… I didn't know this was your room. Hello, Zamasu."

 **l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l**

 **Hey hey, look okay that cliffhanger wasn't as amazing as it sounds, this chapter is also really long, but y'all didn't think I would upload on April Fool's day, huh?** _ **Well, you would've fuckin' thought.**_

 **I dunno if some of you are savvy with some New York slang, but the word 'duff' basically means 'punch'. Like if you wanna smack someone straight into Saturn's rings without a passport, you say you wanna duff them.**

 **Just so you know.**

 **And also, the story with the agrimony isn't an actual story, I just made that up. The agrimony represents thankfulness symbolically, and has been used for mainly medicinal and healing purposes throughout history. These author's notes might be all over the place, because technically I'm all over the place; there's the SATS and a few midterms just waiting around the corner, I squeezed this in right before test time because it's convenient *snaps fingers*. I'll see you all in the next upload : 3**


	8. Same Nights, New Days

**No notes for now… on with the story.**

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 **Same Nights, New Days**

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Zamasu's fists didn't fall, but they weren't as clenched as they were before. He didn't expect anyone other than Irene to knock on his door, nor did he think that any of her friends would be _that_ curious.

"Hello, Rebecca." He wasn't in his full armor, so his purple gi and blue pants weren't covered at all. He wasn't that tall, but Rebecca was about seven inches shorter than him, so she was introduced to broad, purple-clad shoulders.

Craning her neck up a little to meet his eyes, she smiled apologetically. "I didn't mean to disturb you or anything, I genuinely was wondering why this door was closed."

Rebecca's modesty was adorable. Not to him of course, but in a general sense. "Why would you wonder about that?"

"Because the only door that is closed in this house is Irene's."

 _Oh_. How well did Rebecca know that woman, to the point where she can tell that all of her doors, excluding her room, were always open? "That's interesting. Now you know who's in this room; is that all you needed?" His voice was kind of impatient, even though he literally had nothing else to do. The book that he was reading is now finished, and he didn't want to meet any other faces after last week. Literally, it takes more than an _entire week_ to recover from socializing with a species he hated.

"Well, I honestly didn't know, so uhh Yeah, that's basically it. I'll see you later." She didn't take any spite from what he said. His obvious impatience didn't go unnoticed, but she decided to leave him be, which was _completely_ unlike her other friend. It wasn't even as though he threatened Rebecca to leave either, she just did.

That was a plus. A tiny plus, because she is a human and humans are ugly beings.

So now, Zamasu walked back to his bed to sit down and stare at the ceiling for the next… however long Irene's meetup is… and think about nothing, because he refuses to look back at his Cold Stone experience.

Actually, the only good thing that he got was the ice cream. That was by far the best part of the three or so hours he spent with them. Literally, when he was getting in the car, he let out the biggest sigh of relief, and the car ride was quiet because he wanted it to be. Even a few days afterward, he would find himself sighing unceremoniously. Now what was he supposed to do?

He will have to suck it up, and go downstairs and avoid looking at Irene or any of the humans in her home. He'll have to go downstairs, grab a book, avoid all contact with any human, and then return to his room…

 _Easier said than done_.

"Jaaaaames, stop it. I'm trying to stir this, you idiot."

Said man was too busy holding Irene by the waist and leaning side to side with his chin against the curve of her neck. This wasn't be a problem to her, if it weren't for the fact that the meringue batter she was dealing with needed the utmost attention, because if she over or under-stirred it, the cookies would come out all messed up. That's not a good thing; you don't ever want messed up meringue cookies.

"I'm trying to dance with you, baby." He buried his face in her neck.

"Do you not see me tryna do this right now?" She pointed with her mixer at the thickening meringue mix. "Look, I'm all about your kisses and dances, babe, but do you want this to _not_ taste good?" She wasn't wrong, James finally let go of her. And like all the amazing boyfriends out there, he started dancing around Irene. _This idiot…_

"Can't I just groove a little bit while you whip up some cookies for us?"

He was actually _grooving_ to Nu-Disco, and as generous as it sounds, he getting closer to ruining the jive of the song for her and her eyes. But it was endearing, adorable; even though he looks like the biggest jock in the city, James was such a sweetheart. He is one of those people whom you can't wholly judge by his appearance.

Well, technically that's everyone, to Irene at least. Every single person has a side that they flaunt, or hide from other people. And because of that, there is really no need to judge anyone in the first place.

 _Tell that to Green Beans up there_.

Speaking of which, Rebecca has been upstairs for some time. Hopefully she doesn't run into Zamasu because he might throw her out his window or something. That man was _upset_ earlier. He hadn't made a facial expression _akin_ to positivity, like a smirk or anything to lighten his eyes. He just did that pouting-scowling thing that he does all the time, always ruining the mood and good vibes for everyone that's been dandy-

Irene turned off her mixer and pulled it out of the thickened egg whites. She _almost_ overmixed them.

"Okay… the thingies are almost done, hun. Call down 'Bec real quick for me." She was now holding a full piping bag and swirling her cookies onto a cookie tray. He complied, calling out Rebecca's name, and Irene was surprised to hear her walking down the stairs the second James called her. "Come over here, and help me! The hell're you doing upstairs?"

Rebecca tilted her head to the side, while leaning against the stair rail. "I was kinda talking with Zamasu."

"Is it that serious of a conversation?" She raised her brows, not because she was annoyed with anything, but because she was surprised that Zamasu would even open his door for her. You learn something kind of new everyday.

"It was like ten seconds. I didn't know he was in his room, and that was basically it." Rebecca shrugged her whole encounter off, because it really was nothing more than short-lived piquing curiosity.

" _Sure_." James narrowed his eyes. "I think you've been up there for a little more than three minutes."

"Have you forgotten that I had to use the bathroom, you idiot?" Rebecca dunced him in the head, and when to help Irene with her cookies. Technically she didn't even need help, she just called Rebecca down because she lowkey didn't know if her friend still had all her limbs intact, or if her eardrums were still okay. She was grateful to see that Zamasu _didn't_ lay a finger on her. "Okay so, what's my job here, Chef?"

"Take these," Literally, Irene already finished piping the cookies onto the tray, " And place them in oven."

"Are you serious right now." That wasn't even a question, that was a statement. Rebecca had a straight face. "The oven is legit _right over there_."

"It's over there, not here. Just doooo iiiiiiiiit…" Irene leaned forward as if she was exhausted beyond belief, meanwhile Rebecca made a mental note to purposely call her friend early in the morning at random just to ask what she was doing. By their friendship status, that kind of stuff is _fair_.

"Fiiiine." She did her part, and they both joined James in the living room who was leaning against the wall on his phone. It's really rare for Irene to find him conventionally on his phone during a meetup, he was almost always engaged 99% of the time.

 _And 80 percent of that time is spent kissing or holding me somewhere_. She smiled, and then her phone rung. She took the device in her hand, looking the caller ID. It was her brother from another mother, the one and only, Adrian. "ADRIIIII!"

She can hear his cringe on the other end. "You are far too freaking hype, nearly done shattered my right ear and shit."

"I'm sorry, fam. How've you been?"

"Hey Adrian!" Rebecca spoke into the receiver, and James yelled a 'Yo what's good bro' from across the room.

"'Eyyy guys, and I've been really good. I'm super relaxed."

"Aww that's really nice. You really need to, you go crazy when it comes to music." Irene had been to his tech-savvy home, and seeing his studio with little-to-no dust particles anywhere, him almost always being in there when she visits, along with his trademark 'I am producing and I'm only wearing sweats and a shirt' getup was enough to prove that. Sometimes she wondered if he slept when he really needed to, and then she remembered that he was Adrian; Adrian always does what's best for him. "Speaking of which, how's Jay?"

There was a pause. "Umm…" Another pause. "I went out, came back… he looked like he just came out of his grave, I tried telling him to go to stop, and he kept refusing. He couldn't even eat his food, this man was so tired."

"Did he nearly pull a 24-hour streak again?" If Jay was diagnosed as an insomniac, she probably wouldn't even be surprised.

"More like an almost 63-hour streak. This month's longest."

"THIS MONTH?!" Irene's eyes were as wide as saucers. "You mean to tell me my boy stays up for longer than that?"

" _You'd be surprised_." He sighed. "The longer he stays up, the more irritable he is. He throws things a lot too, and can't aim for shit while doing so."

 _How cute_ , she thought. When it came down to throwing things, it would be as if he had aimbot or something installed in his eyes. He could be in the kitchen, toss a spoon behind him, and it'll end up hitting you right on your head. "Gosh. Is he asleep now though?"

"Like a good hour ago. I don't think he's waking up until like… tomorrow afternoon at least."

"Just like a mother, ain't he?" Rebecca giggled at the dynamic of Irene's two guy friends. If it wasn't Adrian keeping Jay in check at rare occasions, it was Jay being aggressively caring for Adrian, mostly in the food department. Adrian didn't know he was on speaker the whole time, so hearing Rebecca's two cents in this startled him.

"I ain't no mother to that motherfucker."

"So he doesn't fuck you?" Irene snorted so loud at Rebecca's sudden question that she ended up falling against the sofa in laughter. James straight busted out laughing.

"WHAT THE FU- Bro I swea- What- _Where the fuck did that come from_?" Adrian was literally sounding frustrated, and it made Irene laugh harder.

"But answer the question though." After calming her laughing raid, Irene came back to snap at Adrian.

"No...for fucks sake- I regret my decision on calling your bitch ass."

"Okay, okay, I apologize I just...couldn't help it." Rebecca and Irene couldn't hold in their laughter. "I'ma have to sit after that, geez that was gold."

"Matter of fact; James, your girl is over here dying to sit on your lap."

"You look pretty alive to me." Rebecca butted in, and Irene threatened to playfully punch her.

James laughed. "I'm on my wayyyyy." He did this semi-jog to Irene.

"I am deadass 'bout to hang up."

"Nononononono, please stay, 'Dri. I love you, trust me." Rebecca held her hands to her chest and spoke warmly, her voice like a soft caress to an open ear. Her honey-like voice made any man's ability to deny her words completely null and void.

"That is _utter_. _Bullshit_."

Well, except for Adrian, of course.

"Are you denying my love for you, sweetie?" She sounded hurt over the phone, but Adrian could damn near sense the smirk on her face.

"Stop calling me that."

"Isn't that what you are?"

"Oh, _now_ you're trying to kiss up to me?"

"Is there something going on here that I should know about?" James pointed his finger at Rebecca and Irene's phone. "First we got Adrian and Jay's affair, and now Rebecca and Adrian are having one?"

Adrian was actually kind of getting defensive. "Hell fucking no!"

"Hey, what's that supposed mean?" Rebecca placed her hands on her hips.

"It means the opposite of 'hell fucking yes'."

And then Irene, in Zamasu's universe-famous words, came in and completely ruined everything… for the better. "Why would hell fuck yes?"

Adrian couldn't help the stupid chuckle erupting from his mouth. Rebecca shook her head at her bestfriend. "That was real stupid." But she still laughed anyway.

"Babe, you serious?" James snickered.

"What were talking about before our conversation was _rudely_ interrupted?" Adrian on the other end swung his legs off the armrest of his couch.

"I came in at the right time." Rebecca squinted. "You better have an explanation for that visceral reaction when I see you."

"Yeah, yeah, I will. I might...later."

Irene chuckled. "This is a part of the conversation, Adrian."

He groaned. "Remove Rebecca from the room."

"You're being so mean to me, Adrian." Her pretend-sweet voice was so damn good. Irene and James both laughed because these two could very well be a married couple; always bickering at eachother. The reason why she thought that was because they did have a history together, a really adorable one at that. She wondered why Adrian would end it though, and seeing how underlyingly serious Adrian was with Rebecca, she felt the need to cut that 'affair' topic short.

"I can't remove my bestie from this phone call, though." Irene snaked her hand over Rebecca's shoulder and pulled her close. Meanwhile, Adrian made a scoffing sound.

"I feel so hurt right now." Even though he was smiling but _bitterly_ , not because Irene was best friends with Rebecca, but because he really did not like Rebecca. He's not as good as covering his emotions as Jay, so if the squad were face-to-face, the chagrin would be evermore apparent.

"Adrian," James reached over to take Irene's phone from her hands. "You got me at least, I'll hold it down for you."

" _Yeeeeah_ , that's what I'm talking about, of course it's us guys that stick together." Irene whipped around at her phone as if Adrian was there.

"Bitch, we've been going strong since school days. We're stuck like _glue_."

James snorted. " _Uh huh,_ dollar-store glue, shit."

Irene took a pillow and threw it, aiming at James' head. However, he bent and swerved sideways to dodge it even though it technically was too high to make contact with even his forehead, and it instead made contact with someone else's chest.

Zamasu, after a reasonably short amount of time and a lot of mental compensation, decided to take the plunge and retrieve another book for him to read in his room. Before he took a step on the stairs, he took a deep breath, hearing Irene's comrades saying things that he didn't care about, but he wished they could just turn into dust instantaneously. He walked down the stairs until he could only see a man and two feminine legs in front of the spiraled stairs. He only could see that for a few seconds, until a pillow came hurling at his chest. When it hit him, he stood still, blinked, looked down at the pillow, and then took a few more steps to glare at the three pairs of eyes that didn't know he was coming down the stairs. James literally backed away, and Rebecca raised her brows nervously. The only person who wasn't showing any kind of fear was, you guessed it, _Irene_. His eye twitched.

Zamasu picked up the pillow from the floor. He took another _relaxing_ deep breath, looking straight at all of them. Then he spoke eerily calm. "Who threw this?"

Rebecca didn't know if she should point at Irene and smirk because Zamasu looked like he was about to burn them all at the stake. James flicked his eyes at his girlfriend, with an 'if-I-don't-move-I-won't-get-killed' expression. So Zamasu repeated himself one more time.

"I threw it." The main culprit of his pure hatred raised her hand. "But it wasn't meant for you. It was meant for him." She pointed at James, who literally could have resembled a mannequin right now because he was actually a bit scared.

"He was an idiot for moving out the way, I apologize." Rebecca gestured at James, and he turned to her.

"I didn't want a concussion, okay?" He smirked at Irene.

"Her aim was so off though. It flew past his head." Rebecca started to chuckled, but was semi-silenced by Irene's look.

She placed her hands on her hips. "It was _decent_." She took a quick glance at Zamasu who, as an understatement, looked really upset.

"What just happened?" Everybody completely forgot that Adrian was still on the phone. "I was about to leave because there is something I gotta handle, but why were you all silent?"

James spoke up. "Zamasu just came downstairs."

"Oh, hey Zamasu." Zamasu looked at the small device in James' hand.

The Kaioshin just sighed. " _Hello._ "

Irene took a step forward. "Why did you come downstairs? I thought you got tired of me?"

"I came down to get another book to read." He set his feet on the living room floor, and then turned to the bookshelf. When he got there, the trio were still relatively silent, and that irked him too. " _Ignore me_."

He said that with so much gripe and irritation, that Irene actually didn't _want_ to say anything to counteract his behavior. Rebecca was the first to respond, and to Zamasu's slight surprise, she brought up a completely different topic to chatter about. That caught the attention of her friends, now he no longer had six dwindle-minded eyes staring at him. He placed down the story book he finished reading, and looked through the spines and blurbs of others until one actually caught his interest. The book was called _Openly Closed_. He'd figure he would settle on this one for the night, it was around a good 300 pages so he opted for another one. 300 pages for him could be read, analyzed and reflected on exceptionally in less than two hours. He picked his second choice with ease, and it was a large book about history. It stretched from the prehistoric ages to this century, this was something that could take a while to read, and it's much better than hearing humans yell at each other. Irene just went to the kitchen to get something out of the oven and he was on his way to the stairs, but stopped in his tracks when his nose caught a savory, sweet and vanilla smell coming from the food. Rebecca was skipping to the kitchen, and James made his way there too. Zamasu narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips, the scene was getting stronger and more delectable.

 _Dammit_.

No, no it is not time to go there and eat any more of the food that Irene makes. That is enough for him, this morning was enough, her attitude is too disgusting to wholeheartedly enjoy anything make from her hands.

"These taste so freaking good, babe." James's eyes were closed as if he entered heaven or something. Rebecca made a small sound of agreement and complimented Irene. And like any other day, Irene leaned over to see the green Kaioshin standing by her stairs.

"Zamasu," she raised her hand to show a meringue cookie. "You want some before you go upstairs?"

Didn't he just say to ignore him not even five minutes ago? Why was she so daft? "I do not want any of your _food_."

"Yes you do. Give this to him. He knows he wants it." Irene handed one to Rebecca, who got to Zamasu and gave it to him. She didn't glance at his books or anything, she just handed him the cookie and stepped back to see his impending reaction.

"Don't stare at me." He turned a lit to the side, and regrettably (not really) took a bite out of the cookie. He fought the urge to close his eyes and bask in the soft yet chewy texture of the small pastry, and just savor the taste- _By Gods the taste_ \- for more than a minute. He didn't have time for this, he needed to go upstairs and leave these humans alon-

"He _really_ likes it, oh my gosh." Rebecca was giggling so hard, and Zamasu opened his grey eyes to see Rebecca's giggling face.

"See? I told you so." Irene yelled from the kitchen and Zamasu was brought back into his main mission. All he had to do was come downstairs, get books, and then return to his room, and now he will enact on it accordingly.

"'Bec," Irene looked at her best friend, "This friggin' recipe is amazing, I swear. Thank you for blessing us with this, fam."

"Hey, don't mention it." She gave Irene a little hug. Pulling back, she turned her head to the left when she felt someone walk right past her from behind. She turned to the right. "Wh-"

Zamasu was in front of the platter, holding his books in one hand, and holding at least four meringue cookies in the other. He glared at the two. "Why are you two looking at me? Stop it."

" _Really_." The two woman spoke simultaneously. Rebecca walked over to one of the cabinets, and pulled out a smaller plate. She placed it next to Zamasu. "Here. That'll make your life easier."

He looked down and placed his cookies in the plate, and then took like three more for _good measure_. He took the plate in a hand, and turned around and up the stairs wordlessly.

His door opened, and he stepped in his room. Will his plate on top of his book sheltered on his forearm, he closed the door in utter relief. He got his books, and now he can read all night while looking out the window right by his bed.

It wasn't really _that_ hard.

He placed the plate down, not making any plans on eating the food he just took, and sat down on his bed with both books in hand. He glossed over the covers of each, the _Openly Closed_ one had a grey textured cover with darkened silver weaved into the sides of the spine. And the history book, like most of them, was a dark shade of brown, to really highlight how old the book should look. These would serve as perfect distractions from the mess that's taking place downstairs. He was now leaning against the headrest of his bed and his pillow cushioned his lower back, he took a deep breath in and then back out. Opening his first selection, he smirked as the voices and noise coming from downstairs drowned out completely.

※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※

It was nearing the break of dawn.

He knew sunrise would be close because the sun was starting to come back up again. He also knew that because Irene's friends left five or six hours ago, and she spent two hours doing whatever she did after they departed, and he heard her footsteps four hours ago. She was well asleep, the house was quiet, the warm comfortable breeze brushed his mohawk back calmly…

And Zamasu was leaning against his windowsill, elbow propped against the white plaster edge with the last pages of the history book in his hand, yet he kept glancing back at the other book that he had picked.

Have you ever read a book or a story, and had to close it completely and had to take a few minutes to stare at the wall because of how _well-written_ it was? Or how about when the story is getting so good that you have to stop reading it for some time just to build up that sweet suspense? Because that's exactly what Zamasu was going through, except he literally read a history book to supplement his igniting interest for his first selection. There is rarely ever a book that would catch Zamasu's attention and actually make him _want_ to wait for the story to unfold rather than just reading it.

Basically, _Openly Closed_ was about a young girl named Ava who grew up and became very spiteful. It was implied that she was a beautiful-looking girl, every male within her school had some kind of attraction towards her, whether it was her beauty, or her kindness. Everyone had assumed that her life was amazing and she had it easy, since she was almost never angry, and she was physically attractive. She would treat her friends and acquaintances well in her teenage years but they usually never notice or thank her efforts, which made Zamasu scoff, that's what _all_ humans do to some extent. Whenever her friends had a problem, they would go to her to rant and or take their anger out on instead of reflecting and introspecting, and she would be there for them.

Here's where the story takes a turn for the worse, and Zamasu would have put the book down if this transition did not happen; not everyone liked Ava. In fact, how people thought about her was very polarized collectively; they either loved her or they hated her guts, and some of these hateful people were a part of her friend group. They made it an entire vow to ruin her last two years there; rumors went by on her behalf, people that liked her soon started to show her animosity, and Ava would find herself walking home alone every single day.

Not that she never walked alone before, but her friends as she mistakenly called them no longer would include her in anything.

The only thing that they _knowingly_ did, was contact her whenever they either needed something to rant about, or whenever something good happened to them. Other than that, Ava was left all alone. Her being an only child of two rich parents did not help her case either, the only time she'd be busy enough to not feel empty was during her job, and whatever work school can throw at her. The dirtiest thing about all of this, as Zamasu seen, is how her group told her all that happened is because of people being stupid when _they_ were the ones who started it.

This literally fueled the anger in Zamasu so much, that he closed the book and had to take a deep breath from how infuriatingly disingenuous and contemptible these people were.

This entire thing happened over a prolonged period of time, it wasn't like everyone turned heads on her in less than a night. It was slow, it was painful, and it made him actively irate. And the whole time, Ava was _completely oblivious_ to all of this nonsense, until nearing the end of senior year. The weekend before graduation which had her birthday in tow, she told her friends that she would buy herself a new car, and her parents would give her money for her birthday shopping; that caught the attention of her friends, and they opted to go shopping with her. In all that time they spent in the mall, these _sneaky cretins_ collectively stole _half_ of the gift money she had in her wallet, and told her that she had probably dropped it somewhere in the mall. They 'helped' her search for it, she ventured out too far apparently, and then they took their car and ditched her completely, even though that was her only available form of transportation. What made matters worse was that it was getting really late, and the mall itself was nearly an hour walk away from her house. With her bags in her aching arms, she decided to soldier on and walk home, the entire time she first felt sad, and then she felt a deep-rooted, sublime, boiling anger within her. When she got home, she placed all of her bags outside of her room, and sat down to think back to what had happened in the past two years, and why she was treated this way for this long, and why she didn't pick up on this earlier.

Ava had no answers for any of those questions.

On graduation day, Ava drove her new car that she got the day after her mall voyage, separate from her parents. She didn't look at anyone, she didn't walk to her group, she didn't say hi or smile when she got her awards, she didn't talk to anyone. Instead, once the ceremony was over, she stood up and told her parents that she was done here, and drove herself back home.

Then college came, and she became laconic. She didn't speak to anyone about any of her problems, or anything that she had to get off her mind at the moment. She was almost the same as she used to be back in highschool, the only difference is that before, everyone else closed her off first, and now, she closed everyone else off before they could even think of doing so to her too. She was still nice, but her kindness was no longer limitless; she wouldn't extend a hand to anyone who tried to come close to her, except for a guy she met who ended up dating her. She cried into his shoulder at one point, because she was truly lonely, but told her boyfriend that she just 'felt like crying'. He hugged her, but she quickly told him that she was okay, and that she needed to finish a project just so he wouldn't get to see her being weak again, because in her mind anytime she was weak served as a way for anyone to torture her for it.

All of this happened in merely two hundred and twenty six pages.

And now Zamasu, he had admit it, was hooked on it. He didn't know why but just the way it was written and how much he could relate to Ava and her storming anger for the people around her was something that he found remarkable. However, even though she hated other people, it was clear that she was hurting far too much, and was too afraid to retract her mindset. He was up to a part in the book where she gets into a car accident, and when she tries to call her boyfriend, there was no answer. She got a few notification from whatever social media she was using, and saw a few pictures of her boyfriend holding and kissing another girl, recently posted an hour ago, which was eerily close to when her car collided with a truck.

Zamasu literally couldn't read the book all the way through, because it was too interesting to finish in one single night, and because he was actually getting angry at what was happening to Ava. Geez, humans are horrible, idiotic creatures. Her friends were far too sneaky for her to realize how much they were causing her pain, and now the person that passed through this mind was Jay. The Asian male was a chameleon when it came to hanging around people; Zamasu picked up on his annoyance with a third of the group, and he was always able to mask it off with a terrifically genuine smile. That was a feat that was hard to master, even Zamasu reckoned he can't pull that off as well as Jay did. He didn't like him at all, and he wondered how could anyone else like him once they find out that he was so ingenuine. He closed the history book, and then opened it again because he didn't read the last paragraph. Don't you hate when you have to re-read a part in the book because your thoughts were on something else?

He took a break after he was finished, staring out the window at the sky and the sun and the greenery around the abode. The break was long too, it was supposed to be thirty minutes but it turned into three hours… or something close to that. Technically, it could have been considered meditation at some points, and at some point he would think. He enjoyed how calm and warm the weather was today.

Someone knocked on his door.

 _Why. Is. She. Awake. At. This. Time?_

You should see how fast his facial expression changed from placid to total animosity. It was almost comical.

He whipped around, and went to the door but didn't open it. He instead spoke through gritted teeth. "What do you want this _early in the morning_?"

"Umm, you're acting like you woken up from a deep sleep. Calm down." He could feel the smirk on her face. It made his fists clench. "And I dunno what you're talking about, it's not early at all."

Is she stupid? "What do you mean it's not early?"

"It's 11:59."

Zamasu cocked his neck back. Did time really go by _that_ fast? "...It is?"

"Yes, and I made breakfast already, Lima Beans." What... in the living hell is a Lima Bean? Zamasu let out an exhausted groan, one day he'll punch his room door and hopefully it would hit Irene on the other side while she's walking by. She already closed his door and if he wanted to, he could've just done that now but this is Zamasu we are talking about right now.

The Kaioshin presents himself as a methodical diplomat. And he is… minus the misanthropy and genocidal tendencies.

So he opened his door again, why did she even close it? Why the heck would she walk all the way here, just to tell him that there was breakfast downstairs, and then close the door on him right after? Did she have any sort of respect, or did she think he was going to open that door on his own behalf, that little- _Calm down_. He took, for the umpteenth time, another deep breath; the door could not open itself, so why the heck would he stand here being upset at how insipid some human woman's action were? He opened the door himself, because he actively wanted to, and stepped out of his room after a good twelve or something hours being cooped up in there. He ran his green hand through his white mohawk, walking directly to the stairs, and then he abruptly planted his feet on the ground.

What the hell was he doing? Why was he walking down to where she was, was it because of her damned food? Okay, obviously it was, but it wasn't that important. He was an apprentice of Gowasu, a species of beings who created everything for crying out loud, he didn't need to eat any food as much as he has in the past month, let alone human food for that matter, because _gross_. And maybe he was starting to suffer from being in such a densely populated planet with such densely beings, because now he was actually taking _slow paced steps down the freaking stairs_.

Before he even knew it, he was silently sitting in the dining room, and Irene just finished serving herself. She turned around, greeted by the same silent figure who swore up and down that he wouldn't step foot in her kitchen for the sake of food. "I deadass was not expecting you to come by. I'd thought you'd just stay upstairs and do your nerdy stuff there all day."

He squinted at her for being so impetuous. That's the word he should start describing her as; impetuous. It sounded nice and fitting. "I would have."

Sometimes Zamasu wondered if he could possibly dumb himself down further, but that last statement was more than enough to birth an urge to facepalm. Of course he would have, _of course_ , but he didn't because… well, he didn't know why he didn't stay up there. No, he did know; it was because of her stupid food, and her stupid face barging in his room just to tell and tempt him of her breakfast, that she made with her _impetuous_ hands.

"But you didn't anyway." She could definitely read how frustrated he was, and obviously enjoyed it. Look at that arrogant smirk on her face. "Well, you're in for a treat, sonny."

He blinked. "I'm far older than you."

Irene looked back at him with a raised brow. "Never said you weren't." She was clever, and she was clever because every time she taunted him, she made it sound like it was no big deal. And this usually is when she has a witty rebuttal or a comeback just waiting for him in the corner. To normal people, this would just be Irene being playful as usual. Zamasu didn't see that at all, even as she was approaching him with a rather big polished bowl of food. "Here."

When the bowl was set in front of him, he couldn't help but marvel at how aesthetically pleasing the serving was. The bowl was composed of greens, and he knew some of their names; there were five ripe and fresh slices of avocados sitting over each other like fallen dominoes. The kale leaves and the assorted mix of carrots, brussel sprouts, chickpeas, and these little red things Zamasu didn't know the name of served as a bed underneath the avocados (said bed was actually pretty dang huge for it, anyway). The bowl itself was a nice shiny mahogany colors and that just _multiplied_ the entire look of the meal. He took his fork, and snapped back to reality when he realized Irene was still right beside him.

She just started laughing. "You've never seen pomegranates before?"

He frowned. "Seen what?"

"Those little red thingies. Those are pomegranates, I got all of this in the garden yesterday afternoon."

White brows rose. "You have a garden?"

She smiled. "Well yeah, you never… seen it before?" In all the nearly 44 days of being here, he had never seen a garden while he was just outside her kitchen. "It's the gate to the left of the kitchen door. Just in case if you wanna hit it up, but don't eat my plants over there."

"Why would I do that?" He looked at her kind of offendedly.

"I dunno." He rolled his eyes and shook his head. Irene clasped her hands behind her back. "I didn't want anything heavy. So for today's breakfast I just went for mostly _greens_."

His eye twitched. "Let me eat this in peace, _woman_."

"I have a name, Kale." She started to chuckle. "You know what, that's your new nickname; Kale. It sounds cute."

He whipped his head at her; he didn't even eat yet, and he was already starting to lose his temper. "You better put that idiotic nickname away. Address me as Zamasu."

"Okay, then address me as Irene." Zamasu did nothing but scowl at her; fair enough. He will address her accordingly; according to how ignorant and disgusting she and her behavior is. She turned around, and decided to eat in the kitchen which was a plus for him. So now, he held his fork in one hand, and went straight down for the kale salad.

...Perhaps it was because he was a Kaioshin, but anything that included vegetables apparently tasted amazing by tenfold. There was slight strong but not obnoxious flavoring in it and he had no idea what that was, but he liked it a lot. He didn't eat much of the pomegranates because they were fruits, and eating fruits weird because you know, his kind comes from trees. Apple trees, to be horribly descriptive but still, he couldn't bring himself to eat fruits at all. He didn't know how long he spent on the table slowly eating and taking his time, but while he was halfway finished, Irene started talking about going to her 'secret room' and working on something. He didn't respond to her, and she just left.

When he finished, he placed his bowl in the sink, and was suddenly overcome by the urge to leave. Not just leave this planet (is that not an underlying urge already), but just leave the house for a few hours or so. Zamasu decided on it, he'll do whatever he feels, it's not like he'll be in danger or anything not innocuous. The thought of that made him chuckle.

He stepped out of her front door, and he decided to allow his flying abilities to be put to use instead of just walking. He hovered and then propelled until he could literally see the entire scope of the suburbs and the city beneath his feet. He looked around to find somewhere with some greenery, and also opted for the same place to be far away from Irene's house. There was one to his upper right, and it apparently was huge, but there were people within it. Not a lot of them were around too, it was considerable due to its large size and its distance from the house. He noticed that there were trees and fountains on certain areas, and there was a lake nearby. Zamasu let out a breath that he didn't really know he was holding in, and smirked down at his chosen location, this will definitely be the perfect place to relax completely.

 _And for real this time._

 **l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l**

 **There are a lot of really little symbols that I added in this chapter. So if you don't want a little teaser(?), you can skip this note. If not, I'ma give you guys a little taste of them.**

" **The only door that is closed in this house is Irene's." Let that sink in for a bit; when someone's door is closed, it means that they either have secrets or things that have not been shared, or the person that sees a door closed does not know the other well, or rather knows nothing of them.**

 **Irene nearly overmixed her meringue mix was in conjunction with her thoughts towards Zamasu. She quickly cut off the mixer, and cut off her thought with how negative he is. Overmixing of the egg whites correlates to overthinking his actions, and being wholly angry at him all the time. She knows very well that he just doesn't** _ **know**_ **humans yet, this goes back to her not judging other people.**

 **I think it has been implied earlier that Adrian and Rebecca have dated in the past. Irene still doesn't know the real reason as to why they broke up, but it will come up in later chapters.**

 **That's all I gots to say, my birthday is actually three days from today (as in the day this story is updated) and I had so much energy throughout the week so this came by a bit early.**


	9. Swift Change Of Plans…

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 **Swift Change Of Plans… That weren't even plans in the first place**

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Zamasu landed daintily on the ground, his feet barely making any noise when making contact with the ground. None of the humans that were relatively far from where he landed even saw him, that was a plus in his book. Closing his eyes and feeling the breeze on his face, he started walking along the stone path.

He really had to admit it, this entire landscape looked _beautiful_. The pond's surface along the walkway glistened blithely as tiny little fish swam around, all of which were in various bright and enthusiastic hues. The stone walkway was even beautiful; it wasn't perfectly straight and polished, but it was jagged and almost resembled a mosaic. There were birds chirping along the path, most of them housed themselves on the branches of trees, and smaller mammals like squirrels scurried around the vicinity. Zamasu turned when he felt light contact on his upper left arm and raised his brows when he noticed it was a bird. With gentle hands, he raised his right pointer finger below the tiny animal, its small legs now grasped against his green finger. Hand still raised, he continued his trail with a clear and light mind, all the while with the bird perched comfortably on his finger. He spent at least half an hour wandering, and of that time he had reached the actual park, where all the people were _unfortunately_. Well, not really; there were only kids running around and adults supervising them or going off their own things and whatnot.

It was still unfortunate for Zamasu. The park looks much more beautiful without the same species that are actively polluting it. You would think Zamasu didn't know about that either. He had read that public facilities were actually dirtying the air in major cities; in rurals and suburbs, such pollution isn't as pungent. It still annoyed him at how humans could blindly turn away from actually keeping their home planet safe.

In fact, that was another thing he had noticed on his first time being out of Irene's house. He got a first person glance at how _unconscious_ people really are. The city gave him a scope of his rushed and mentally uncoordinated humans are, they act like they don't have time to be _decent beings_. How did they progress this far? Well, they were once little infants in his eyes. Okay, they still are, but now they are like crying little snobby children who have gotten too full of themselves before they even got a chance to realize how much potential they have.

Zamasu took a seat on a wooden bench, propping his elbow on his knee and his chin against his palm; he has seen the first humans and their primitive lifestyles; running and killing for the sake of survival. It was something that he understood as a result of animal instinct, because humans were more akin to animals in their behavior. They have developed sentience, their brains grew bigger, and they became more independent. They started to write, they started to communicate through languages whether it be written or vocalized, and they collectively made their own civilizations.

Here was the problem with all of that; they were _still_ killing each other.

When it came down to differences of any kind, humans would suddenly be intolerant, and they'd kill or ostracize them from their society. Soon, Zamasu noticed that this idiot species learned more of the arts of deception and trickery than they did of truth and honesty. And for those who have delved into the latter, they are more than likely traumatized or tortured by the dirty collective mindset of everyone else. Even if he was in the present, and humans have colonized almost every part of Earth, it was still _needless_ for them to hold on to such stigma towards differences. It made no sense. And they were being reckless and arrogant about it too.

Zamasu's eye twitched; arrogance, something that he sees so prevalent in the humans species. They write all these books about the Earth and the universe and pride themselves on just knowing the information they have _at that moment._ They literally stick to principles of the past, expecting to find new discoveries with outdated methods. It's redundant, everything about their thought process was redundant. He's had enough of a taste of it from a single woman, who he happens to live with.

Ever since he stepped foot into her home, his hatred for her only continued to _grow_. Anytime he'd think of her, he'd have a negative visceral reaction because she was just disgusting. It makes sense that she belongs to this species since Irene acts so unruly. If there was one thing that she made him want to do, it's to punch her in the face and break every single limb on her body.

He no longer felt the tiny feet of the bird anymore, it flew away while he was thinking.

Zamasu cut his thoughts off completely; he came here to relax, not to gripe about being in a beautiful planet nestled with a skin infection. So that's what he did, he leaned back, placed his hands behind his head and closed his eyes, meditating in the tranquil comfort of nature. He didn't really know how long he sat like this, all he knew was that the air got slightly cooler. From this guess he figured it was now in the afternoon.

He felt a small nudge against his leg. His first instinct was to ignore it, until he felt the nudge again and realized through the material of his pants that this wasn't from a human. Then he heard a small giggle from a woman, and that's when he slowly opened his eyes to look down. What met his eyes was a small white dog, its beady black eyes stared back at him. Then the puppy made it's way around his leg, sniffing him, and finally sitting right next to his foot.

"I think he likes you."

He almost didn't even acknowledge the woman before him, her voice was familiar. It was Irene's friend, Rebecca. She was standing in front of him wearing pale green jeans and a white tank top. She had a leash wrapped and attached to the side of her pants. She looked down at him with a really warm smile, her hair blew cooly in the breeze. She had a leash hooked on the side of her pants but it wasn't attached to her dog. Zamasu didn't answer her immediately, his attention went to her dog who just now jumped up the bench and sat on his lap. And then he proceeded to lick Zamasu's face.

The Kaioshin didn't push him away, nor did he try to smack the dog's tongue off of his cheek because the dog wasn't a human. Instead, he just sat there a little confused, and then he started to chuckle from the mammal's cordiality. This made Rebecca laugh, and her laugh didn't sound like Irene's. Irene's laugh, whenever it pertained to him, always had that sardonic and annoying tone to it. Rebecca's sounded warm and lighthearted, he knew she wasn't genuinely out to insult him. "I'm...pretty sure he… does."

He couldn't even speak thoroughly because the dog was being a little too busy liking him.

Rebecca held her hand out and did a single clap. "Ollie." Ollie stopped his licking fiesta, and turned to his owner. Rebecca sat beside Zamasu, he took into note how she gave him some space, and the she clapped twice, beckoning her dog to come to her. Which he did, he jumped to her lap and sat pliantly. Rebecca reached into her bag and took out a small handkerchief and handed it to him. "Here. Ollie usually doesn't do all that. He does that to a certain group of people." She chuckled.

Zamasu looked down at her hand and took the handkerchief. He was about to wipe his face, but then he stopped. "You don't need this?"

Rebecca giggled. "It's just Ollie's saliva, it's not anything special. Go ahead and wipe your face, it's okay."

He did, quickly and efficiently. He then handed it back but made sure the part where Ollie's saliva is on would not touch her hands. "...Thank you." She took it and bid him a 'You're welcome' back. Rebecca placed the handkerchief back in her bag, and while she was doing that, Ollie moved a bit towards Zamasu. He wasn't completely off of her lap, but he reached out and placed a paw on his thigh. She turned to see Zamasu's hand on top of Ollie's paw. " _Awww,_ I didn't know you liked dogs."

The grey-eyed Kaioshin blinked at the red headed woman. "Huh?"

"Ollie only acts like that when he knows the person likes dogs." She rubbed the back of Ollie's head.

That's actually really bright of her dog to be able to intuitively tell when someone likes dogs or not. "I just like animals in general."

She raised her brows, her interest was piqued. "Really? That's kinda surprising."

He frowned. "What is that supposed to mean?" He didn't ask that as if she was offending him, he was genuinely curious.

"Well- ooh, okay Ollie, go and sightsee." Ollie escaped from his comfortable spot on her lap, and started wandering around. Zamasu noticed how she smiled at Ollie as he walked away, akin to how a mother would smile at their child when they depart from them. Rebecca turned back to him. "Okay, well… Irene told me some things-"

Oh no, did that stupid woman dirty his damn respectability by telling them the stupid things that _she_ buckets with him over? How dare she even tr- "Zamasu?"

His thoughts were cut short. "What?"

"Are you good? I said barely a full sentence and your eye just started twitching."

"Oh… Yes, I'm fine."

Obviously, it was due to a certain person's name, and Rebecca didn't want to bring up anything that would be negative, so she left it at that. "Irene tells me about every time you two fight and what you say and stuff. So I thought that you were a little mean to everything."

He just did this semi-sigh semi-groan thing. "I wouldn't be surprised if she tells you what I eat in her house."

"You eat anything she makes you."

"No I don't." He answered far too quickly, Rebecca even knew he was damn near lying.

" _Uh-huh_ ," She placed her hands on her hips. "Yesterday you tried to smuggle five cookies upstairs."

"I had _four_ of them yesterday." He literally held out four fingers to further validate his claim of not eating everything in Irene's house.

"Honey, it's not that big a difference." Rebecca smirked while Zamasu kind of grimaced, but it wasn't the usual 'I want to kill you repeatedly for several months' type of grimace. "."Nothing wrong with it either, I don't even know why you deny it."

He denies it because he hates Irene's guts. That's why. "I think you could tell from the amount of times she annoys me, _daily_."

"True, true." She nodded. "She told me not to think of you like that, though."

Zamasu slowly turned to her, confused. He tilted his head. "Not to think of me like what?"

"Ya know like… not to think you're super mean." Rebecca had her hands clasped together on her lap, her legs were crossed over one another. That made him think; why would she say that, despite the amount of times they verbally fought? You see, a normal person would have thought that if you talk to someone horribly and they tell others not to think you're a piece of shit, it would be a kind thing to do. It would save your respectability, because perhaps that person knows or can tell that you aren't like that. But Zamasu, on the other hand, found it as underlying pity, that she told Rebecca not to think that he was mean, but rather blame it on his ignorance. That vermin woman was trying to belittle him in the most subtle way possible! How dare she-

"I mean you don't seem mean. You're just really quiet, but I guess it's because you don't know us."

 _What did she mean by 'us'?_ Did she mean Irene and her entire crew, or did she mean humans as a whole? Zamasu could slap himself right now, why is he overthinking all of this? "This really wasn't my plan at all. I really don't want to be here."

"I know that. Irene told me that you have a teacher who just kinda put you here."

 _Does everyone know about this story?_ Rebecca spoke about this like it was common knowledge. His voice became bitter. " _I figured._ "

"I can't really say that you'll have a swell time here, but I hope you enjoy an entire year with us." She chuckled and extended her hands out awkwardly, because how the hell do you tell some student that hated humans who's stuck on a planet filled with them to _enjoy the experience?_ "I really do."

What caught his attention was the first part of her statement, because Zamasu knows that this experience was worthless and meant nothing and his hatred for humans will only grow from now on, and he was kind of wondering if there was a negative connotation to what she said. "Why can't you say that I'll have a good time here?"

Rebecca looked down at her lap. "Well uhh, we can kind of be, to put in really light terms, _utter shit_ sometimes."

 _THERE WE GO, FINALLY SOMEONE SAID IT-_ Wait a minute, wasn't she human too? "You hate them too?"

She did this thing where she held her I hands out on her knees for emphasis. "Well I don't _hate_ them but… I think we can do better as a consensus."

Truthfully, deep down, that was something Zamasu honestly wanted to see from this species for _so long_. And with the level of technology they have, they could have _been past_ world peace. And now he has someone that shares the same sentiment as he does… except more diluted because he despises humans. This felt weird, because every other person (aka Gowasu) has said that humans are not ill beings. Having someone who related to him in this way was eccentric. "This species is far too ahead of itself to even be worried about the mess that they are worried about now. It's disgusting how they carry out their frustration."

Rebecca frowned a little at his response, trying to pinpoint his terminology. Then she got it. "You mean by fighting and killing instead of compromising? That stuff is getting old."

She is getting _brilliantly accurate_ with this. "Exactly!"

Rebecca sighed heavily. It was as if the topic was something that she thought about for so long, and she was getting tired of it. "I don't ignore none of that stuff, when I talk about stuff like this it literally exhausts me. I get a little… too passionate about it." She nervously giggled. "Besides, I am here at the park. Ollie is over there chasing a butterfly, I'm here to just chill."

It's as if they both were the same person. "That's the main reason why I came here." Zamasu said. "I just need to relax and _not argue_ with someone for at least a day." Technically that was already broken because Zamasu and Irene semi-argued this morning.

"I get you on that." She laughed. "And here we are, talking about how annoying people could be."

He snorted. This was actually the first time he's found something remotely amusing. "Something that passes my mind every single day."

"And then once you talk about it, it's like the longest conversation you could ever possibly have." She leaned forward to scratch her ankle.

His eyes went wide with a slight grin. "A conversation that I'll both enjoy and hate. I never actually spoke to anyone about this to such an extent."

Rebecca leaned towards him. "Really?" Zamasu nodded and she smirked. "You better stop me if I ever get far too _into_ this topic. Like legit tap my shoulder or even shake me because I become the biggest motor mouth."

"It's better than being called a uhh… a _Lima bean_ , or whatever the heck that is." Zamasu rolled his eyes.

Rebecca giggled, but this was a different type of giggle. It was that giggle that sounded like she was subtly agreeing with what Irene called him. "What's so funny?"

Ollie was now returning back to his rightful owner. "I mean… you do look like one. Like you're the same color as a Lima bean." Zamasu rolled his eyes and groaned. Is this what this whole 'experience' is going to be reduced to? Just him constantly being called names of foods, most of which he didn't even know about?

Didn't he ask this question a few weeks ago?

He blinked when a small device akin to Irene's was held out to him. Rebecca was showing him a picture of green little beans in a bowl. "Why are you showing me-" And then he scowled at her.

"C'mon, it's the _same exact color_!" her laughter was far too loud for such a comparison to even be considered amusing. Zamasu just sat there with his arms crossed, as he waited for her to quit her laughing fit. When she finally ceased, Ollie returned to his spot on her lap, and she smiled at the Kaioshin sheepishly. "...I'm sorry."

"I'm starting to regret coming here now." Really, he didn't regret it at all. In fact, he did feel a little less riled up than he was back at Irene's place. And he spent half of his time in this park talking with her best friend. Wait a minute… he spent almost an _entire half an hour_ talking to a human being _without_ feeling the need to strangle them senseless. This is an even bigger feat than last week.

"Aww, don't be like that. Even Ollie found it funny." Meanwhile, her dog was happily turning around on her lap due to her caressing his belly.

He looked down at Ollie's smiling face, then back at Rebecca. "He's far too interested in you tickling him than he is with you and Irene's ridiculous analogies."

Rebecca did that sheepish smile again. "Well, you're right." She sighed off her urge to laugh, but couldn't help the tiny chuckled that came out of her mouth. "After this, Ollie's gonna want me to go home. It's… 2:33 in the afternoon." She paused to check the time on her phone.

 _Approximately two hours,_ he thought. He didn't think that he spent _that_ long in the park. "Why would he want to return home?" Was that a stupid question? It probably was.

"Well, I've been out for a long time walking with him, and now he's tired." It was stupid. He could've guessed that on his own.

Zamasu looked down at Ollie. "He is?"

"Yup. He's doing that thing where he lays limp and kinda hides his face. See?" That's exactly what he was doing, except Ollie also yawned and looked up at Rebecca, who was now facing him. "Yes, we're gonna go home. I bought you your favorite snacks yesterday."

Literally at the word 'snacks', Ollie jumped up excitedly and then, realizing he was too tired to celebrate, he laid back down and pulled gently at her shirt with his mouth. A chuckle escaped from Zamasu's lips; that was actually cute. The Kaioshin looked around the grassy terrain, grey eyes calmly taking in the scenery before him. He heard the distant sound of children yelling and laughing while running around the park, along with the sound of Ollie's tiny groans and rustles. The wind was still warm, not too humid but not too chilly either, it felt like a soft caress to one's face. His hair blew in the breeze, brushing past his upper forehead and occasionally making contact with his cheek.

He seriously did not want to return to Irene's house.

He was already relaxing, and the past one hundred and so minutes literally felt like half an hour. Someone like Zamasu needs more than half an hour to recover from stupidity, and as weird as it sounds, Zamasu did not know how to navigate this area without flying. He should easily go back up in the air and find Irene's house, but he simply did not know what any of these areas were labeled, so walking through the premise would deem him getting lost.

"Welp, it looks like Ollie's tired. I'm gonna drop him off at home and probably do something, I don't know what, but I wanna spend some time outside. I can drive you back to Irene's place-"

" _Please don't_." Why is he even speaking? He could just _fly_ , but the thing is, he'd rather not go back _there_ right _now_. Wouldn't it be redundant to let Rebecca drive him? Excluding the time when Irene drove him to Cold Stone, he genuinely did not want to fuss, he just wanted to get it over with. "I'd… rather not go there, I don't feel like it."

She shrugged, complying with his decision. "You can just chill here, then. I'll see you when uhh… whenever I'll see you." Rebecca stood up, bending over to put Ollie on the ground. "Ollie, let's go!" Ollie did not move forward; he looked up at her and made a whiny sound, and then he laid down, as if to signify how tired he is. "Ollie… the walk to the car isn't that far."

He made another reluctant noise, and then he rolled over with his paws in the air. Zamasu snorted; Ollie was _really_ social. Rebecca knelt down right next to him. "Ollie, come on. Don't you want your snacks?"

He rolled again, closer to Zamasu this time, and then made eye contact with the Kaioshin. Ollie sat right up, and then went straight into Zamasu's lap which made the green man jump a little. He started pulling gently against the fabric of Zamasu's gi while moving his legs. "Uhh…"

Rebecca smiled. "I think he wants you to carry him. That's actually really rare; he's comfortable with people but not that comfortable." She placed her phone back in her purse. "Or he's just that lazy. Ollie, Zamasu is not going to carry you."

Ollie looked up at Zamasu, and the Kaioshin would be dead lying if he didn't say that Ollie's puppy face wasn't adorable. He really did not like doing favors for others, but this was Ollie technically 'asking' him for transportation. Zamasu could've said no, he could have let Ollie go back to Rebecca's arms, and he could have sat here in the park for the next few hours.

 _But he feels nice and small on my arms._ "I can carry him to your car."

Rebecca raised her eyebrows, but nodded. "Okay. Come, I'll lead the way." She made this gesture with her arms forward and started walking to the left of the bench. Ollie made a tiny sound of approval and nuzzled his head into Zamasu's chest.

The walk wasn't even that far; it was only a mere five minutes. There was no conversation during the walk, it was in complete silence but in a comfortable silence where neither party did not feel the need to speak. And the whole time, he was mostly preoccupied with little Ollie. Her car was a sleek chrome-quartz hue with clean grey-tinted windows, the bottom portion of the car would light up when the ignition turned on, akin to Irene's car, except Rebecca's would change color, from blue to green to red recursively. Ollie laid quietly in Zamasu's arms, and he had to shift him over to one arm in order to open the car door. As soon as the door was completely open, Ollie sprung out of Zamasu's arms and into the backseat.

Rebecca rolled her eyes. "Oh _now_ he has energy. What a potato." She entered the car, and looked at Zamasu. "Alright, it was nice talking with you, Zamasu. Bye-bye." Zamasu did this half-wave, because he was still surprised that he had actually had a _remotely good time_ talking to a _human being._ It was almost phenomenal that such a thing could even happen to him because he couldn't imagine a single human being who was just as disappointed as him. He bid her goodbye, closed the door that Ollie just jumped through, and started to walk off.

He didn't even get two steps in yet, and he felt something tugging against his left pant leg. He turned around to see Ollie biting his pants and attempting to pull him towards the car.

"Ollie, let go of him, he has to leave." Rebecca had to get out of her car, and scoop Ollie into her arms. The small dog looked at Zamasu with those adorable puppy eyes again, paws outstretched as if silently saying 'Don't leeeeave'.

So he sighed. The Kaioshin pursed his lips, and inhaled. "Does he not want me to leave?"

"He _really, really_ likes your company." Zamasu's face was far too amusing when it was confused. "This is so cute, he wants you to come along with us."

And this dog didn't even want Zamasu to stay in the park by himself in peace. Well, he thought, _it wasn't really that bad._ He really liked Ollie's presence, and apparently Ollie just wanted him to stay. But at the same time, Zamasu kind of wanted to relax and be at peace, even though he is now, but just in a different way.

But those damned puppy eyes stared back at him and he swallowed the growing urge to grab Ollie and just hold him.

"I mean, you don't have to if you want to. I'm sure Ollie won't bark at me or you for it. He'll probably fall asleep as soon as I get home." She held him like an infant, looking down occasionally to see his expression and smiling. It was endearing to see the amount of care Rebecca had for Ollie, and it was evident every time she knew what he wanted.

Zamasu looked between the two and then focused on Ollie. "It wouldn't be a burden to come along, wouldn't it?" That wasn't even a question, that was him _actually_ stating and considering his time and attention to a dog.

Rebecca smiled. "No problem then, get in. See Ollie, he's coming too. You happy now?" Her playful irritation made Ollie perk up, and Zamasu sat in the front seat this time. Ollie went straight into Rebecca's lap when she revved up the engine and closed all the car windows, and placed his paws on her chest while standing. "Ollie, you need to sit back there, I can't see where I'm going if you're standing in my way, sonny."

Zamasu raised a brow. "Sonny? Isn't his name Ollie?"

Rebecca turned the car around. "Oh, that's literally a moniker I call everyone, kinda like the word 'dude' or 'bro'." Ollie then transferred his spot to the back of the car, which surprised Zamasu even more. He knew animals understood language when they are taught, like human children, but to see how responsive he is also made it look like he was actually _her_ child. That was how close Rebecca is with him. "This is gonna be a sort of short car ride, like about twenty minutes soooo just sit back and chill."

Zamasu spent his time looking out the window. Occasionally, he'd hear Ollie shuffle in the back, and at some point in the car ride he turned around to find Ollie looking right at him. The dog then jumped onto his lap, and commenced to sniffing his chest. The Kaioshin smiled; it was a genuine smile, from a healthy place. "What breed is he?"

"He's a pug." She reached out to nuzzle the back of his ear. "Ain't he cute?"

Ollie was mostly white, but his nose and cheeks were black and his eyes were a dark chocolate brown when reflected by the sun. He was looking up at Zamasu again, his tongue was out and he had a jolly smile on his face. Even though Zamasu was a scholar and was a very rigid person, that did not exempt his lenience for cute things. "He is."

They arrived at Rebecca's house, it was notably bigger than Irene's but there was one major difference; there were a _lot_ of luxurious decorations around her garden; her front yard was literally filled with flowers, fresh grass, bushes and there was a tree on the right of the decomposed granite path which was surrounded by large green stones. Her patio had pale tiles, and marble columns. This smaller location was on par with the park's appearance.

"You like the view?" Rebecca opened her car door and stepped out, motioning for Ollie to exit the car as well.

"It looks… Exceptional." It still wasn't in him to complement human-made things. Sure, he may have implied Ollie to be cute but Ollie is a dog and animals to him are endearing in general. It's not like she gave birth to Ollie, that would've been a completely different story; he'd probably fast-walk far away from Rebecca if she had a human child with her. He contemplated staying in the car, and Rebecca voiced a question that would aid to his thoughts.

"You know you're more than invited to come in my place, dude." She was now all the way at the door inserting her key into the lock, Ollie all the while standing on his hind legs with his paws on Rebecca's lower thigh.

So he did step out; it wasn't a bad idea primarily, it's just that this wasn't really how he planned to spend his day. "Do you humans have a knack for just letting people into your house?" He approached her open door and took a step in, eyes widening at the sight before him.

He literally did not _expect_ Rebecca to have a knack for so many rich items. The living room was the first thing his eyes were welcomed to, this area was probably bigger than Irene's kitchen, living room _and_ dining room combined. The walls were a bright white that would reflect positively with the Sun. There was a large L shaped couch and another loveseat accompanied with a glass LED table. The carpet underneath looked as fluffy as the pillows on the couch, all of which were facing a really big mounted flat screen TV that was probably just about the same height as him. Ollie's bed was actually in the living room too, it was a light green and black cushion with soft toys inside. The kitchen from his view had gold painted walls, the tiles were a quartz white.

"Well technically, I _know_ you and I know you won't burn my place down or something drastic, so it's okay." Rebecca jogged into the kitchen to get something, while she was in there Zamasu placed his attention on behalf of the decor in her house. Besides the very modern look of it, there was one thing that was prevalent with the placement, the wealth, and the appearance of the house: power. The entire house had a confident, respectful vibe to it. Unlike Irene's house which bursts with creativity, Rebecca was more practical in her decor; there weren't many drawings in her house, the clock was a beautiful chrome gold color and it was around three feet in diameter, and the walls had… _carvings?_ Zamasu approached a wall, and noticed that embedded into it were actual carvings of flowers and leaves. He ran his fingers through it, feeling the intricate curves and shapes against his fingertips. A certain dog's head nudged against his leg. He raised a brow, Ollie laid against his white boot and yawned, eyes scrunching up as his mouth widened for the intake of air.

Geez, he was really adorable.

"Ollie c'mere, I got your sna- really." Rebecca stopped in front of the kitchen entrance when he saw Ollie laying against Zamasu's shoe. She knew her dog very well; whenever Ollie laid on you, it's because he was either too lazy to go sleep on his bed, or he wanted you to carry him there. "I'm surprised he is _this_ comfortable with you."

"This is a first isn't it?" At this point, the Kaioshin knelt down to store the back of Ollie's ear.

"Yeah, he's usually not like that. He's kind of shy, even when he first met Irene he was hiding upstairs. I guess it's because his favorite color is green." Zamasu shot her a look, and she shrugged and giggled. "You can carry him to his bed if you want, or you could sit down with him on your lap. But once he sleeps you'll be stuck there until he wakes up."

Zamasu would go with the second option if he didn't question _why the heck he was even here for this long spending time with another human being_ but it would be suitable for Ollie to be in his bed if he was tired. Zamasu carefully picked him up, noticing that Ollie's collar was green, literally the same color as Zamasu's skin. He placed Ollie down on his bedding with the intention of just leaving, but he ended up petting Ollie for at least a minute or two. Why the heck was he so...weak for this dog? Weak isn't even the right word for this, perhaps a soft side for him; well Ollie is an animal, and animals are innocent. Maybe that's why he ended up in Rebecca's car and then in her house.

Or maybe it was his giant brown eyes and that cute puppy face Ollie made at him. Yup, Zamasu was a sucker for shit like this.

"You want something to eat?" Rebecca had a long bottle of some sort of sparkling drink, which made Zamasu raise his brow but he didn't feel the desire to eat. She was about to walk back into the kitchen when she spoke to him

"I'm fine… Thank you." It's so weird speaking to someone that you presume negatively and actually feeling okay with it. You ever got used to thinking a certain way about a certain thing and when it actually negates your perspective, you get really weirded out by the stark contrast of it? That is what Zamasu is going through right now, or rather what he had been going through for the past hour or something.

"Oh, okay." She returned her drink to the kitchen and sat adjacent to Zamasu. Her shoes were off and for some reason Zamasu took random notice of how nice her feet were. "I take it that Irene's breakfast still has you full?"

He narrowed his eyes. "No, I just don't need to eat as much. I'm not human, remember that."

"I copy. So you just eat just to kinda… eat? Just for the heck of it?"

"...Essentially." Rebecca nodded. Zamasu's species didn't really eat much, but that didn't mean they couldn't handle more than one serving. And so far, Zamasu has eaten more in the past month than he did in last _ten thousand years_ , not only that, but it was much more variety than what he was stuck with back in his realm. He looked at the green eyed woman who looked like she was subtly reluctant to say something. "What is it?"

"Hn?"

"You look like you have something to say."

"Ohhh umm… okay so, please pardon me if I sound stupid right now but," she did this thing where she had that sheepish smile again, but she also raised her hands to her face, "Irene told me you were born from… apples, right?"

This is where he sighs long and hard, because being born from a magical apple tree happens to be a concept that humans cannot grasp. "Yes. I was."

"Okay, so… can you eat apples or fruits in general?"

 _That… was actually not that bad of a question_. He thought she was going to ask if he bled apple juice or something. "I really do not, it's not something I can fancy at all. I just… don't."

Her mouth was parted. "Damn, that sucks. I really, really love fruits. Can't live a day without 'em. That means I can't ever make you a fruit bowl."

"Is that something you've thought of before?" He asked. She said that as though she considered it at one point.

"Wellll, not really. I just like fruit bowls." She chuckled. "I mean it would make sense if you didn't because… that's like your family and stuff." She snorted, not because of ridicule, but because Rebecca actually thought she sounded stupid and it was comical. Then she looked at him in a playful manner. "Do you bleed apple juice too?"

Zamasu facepalmed. _I spoke too damn soon…_ "No, I do not." Then he did something he never really thought he'd d if someone joked about his species; he chuckled. Just the thought of apple juice coming out of a wound… it was really stupid to laugh at.

Rebecca leaned forward. "You don't eat meat, either?"

"Not at all." The Kaioshin diet was far too light for heavy things like meat. "Why are you asking me all of this?"

Rebecca paused, and then she shrugged. "Doesn't this count as me getting to know you better?"

 _Technically…_ Zamasu took that into consideration. "Well, that makes sense, but my diet shouldn't be a concern to you."

"I kinda have a thing for treating my friends. I always ask what they can and can't eat because I invite them to catering places a lot, it's a habit of mine."

A really, really big part of him really wanted to say 'We're not friends', but a very small part of him was like 'I'm only there for the food'. Okay, if it weren't for the fact that Irene practically _dragged_ him to StoneCold and if there was no food whatsoever, he probably would have stayed the hell home and spend his time reading books and not socializing with intellectually declined beings. There is literally nothing to discuss with these people, even though he almost started going in on how humans are terrible with Rebecca because she herself believed the same things he did, but that flew past his mind completely. He heard the sound of shuffling upstairs, turning his head to the general direction. He almost forgot how big a spacey the living room was. "Is there someone upstairs?"

"That's probably Loki. I think he either just woke up, or was just sitting there. That boy sleeps a lot."

 _Loki?_ It's a human boy? Zamasu started to second guess spending more time in here. If there is more than one human being within this household, Zamasu's going to have to fast-walk his way out of here. Rebecca started calling out to Loki, and Zamasu was about to go 'I have to go like right now, please excuse me', until he noticed a white front paw on the top of the stairs. Loki was slowly coming down, once Zamasu could see his face Rebecca got up to kneel in front of the stairs, giving him a bear hug.

Loki was actually _really big_ ; the dog, from Zamasu's point of view, looked like he was about 29 inches at normal. If he stood up he probably would be as tall as Rebecca, maybe even surpassing her height. His lower body was a creamy white color, while his saddle and face were a rich dark brown hue. He had lighter brown eyes than Ollie did, and moved much slower than Ollie at best. Loki may have made eye contact with Zamasu and turned away, moving closer to his owner.

Rebecca caressed Loki's head. "Don't worry, he's just really shy. He has a habit of running upstairs whenever there are visitors in my house."

 _I could relate_. "I do the same thing anyways."

"I'm well aware of that." She smiled at him and Zamasu narrowed his eyes. He would react completely different from when Irene would poke at him. For some reason, with Rebecca, he didn't feel the need to get upset, or the urge to punch her through a wall.

Rebecca pointed at Zamasu, and Loki slowly approached Zamasu and did the normal thing that dogs do; he sniffed him from his boot to his neck, pulling back every once in awhile, and looking downwards. The whole time, Zamasu noticed that Loki was blinking a lot, even though he was resting upstairs, according to Rebecca. Rebecca snapped her fingers when Loki scuttled back to her, kind of like how a shy child turns to his mother when he sees people he doesn't know. It was endearing. "It'll take a while for him to get used to you. Same with Ollie, even though he's more open than Loki, but once you get to know Ollie more, he'll start biting your ears- sometimes literally."

Ooh, that's not something Zamasu would look forward to. His pointy ears are very sensitive too. "Hopefully he won't _actually_ live up to your statement." Zamasu propped his leg up, resting it against his other leg. Surprisingly enough, he was starting to get comfortable even though he would not admit it. Also, a little part of him is questioning his sanity. He watched as Rebecca made gestures towards Loki, and he went into the kitchen. Zamasu knew about different languages from both observations, and reading books, what he identified in front of him was something akin to sign language. "He understands sign language?"

Rebecca looked back at him. "Yeah. I taught him and Ollie pretty early on, but he understands it better. I could have been less sophisticated with it, Loki is pretty young but he understand it well - he's a 3 year-old Malamute."

His eyes widened. "You mean to tell me he got _that_ big in 3 years?"

"Well… less than that. He's been this height for at least a year or so. He's up to my height when he stands on his hind legs."

Zamasu's earlier hypothesis was correct, but the mere thought of it still left the Kaioshin incredulous. "He may as well be a bear, if he's just as tall as me. That's incredible."

"Oh my gosh, my friends say that all the time." She laughed. "Legit they'd go 'I think your dog is a bear' or they'd ask why I'd have a pet bear and a dog. But yeah, Loki is actually a fighter and a little mischievous sometimes, he has that nature, developed it pretty young in his life, even though he's older than me."

"What do you mean almost as old as you?"

"Technically. One dog year is around seven human years, he's three years old and weighs a good 95 pounds, and because of his size that would make him 26 years old in human years. He's technically only a year older than I am, not chronologically."

Zamasu has seen photos and pictures of dogs from books that he had read in the span of more than a month. He had never thought that dogs had the ability to grow so fast in such a short amount of time. With the way Loki was moving around very slowly, Zamasu would have thought he was just sluggish and old, but seeing that Loki was only three years old and resembled a Grizzly Bear at best, it's safe to say that his movement was because of how big he is. One peculiar thing stood out about him and that was the way he moved around; with him blinking excessively and also looking around often, it seemed that he may have a big of trouble seeing. "Does he have bad eyesight or something."

She looked down at him, and timidly chuckled. "Kind of, his eyesight actually got better in a short amount of time. It was much worse when he was rescued."

"He was rescued?"

"Mm-hmm." She paused, shifted a little and sat up straight. "You want something to drink at least? This feels like a tea-time vibe so if ya want I can fix something up for you."

Zamasu frowned a little; it wasn't as if she didn't want to talk about him being rescued, it was more of it being a rather long story and she probably didn't want him to get parched or something. That wouldn't even come close to happening because Zamasu doesn't need that much food. _Says the guy who ate whole breakfasts and cookies made by a woman you hate_. "Well… okay. I guess I can have some tea."

"Oooh tea, I'm in the mood for that too. Does it matter what type?"

"No, not really."

"Okay, I got you." She did this really feminine jog-thing that made Zamasu raise an eyebrow, and then swerved to the side as Loki slowly walked out of the kitchen. The malamute wandered around near Zamasu, but didn't approach him at all. Then when Zamasu actually looked at him, Loki looked back, blinked, and then looked away. _Wow_ , he thought, _He's really shy._ Ollie was actually sleeping this whole time, Zamasu looked at the small pug cuddled in his soft, fluffy bedding, his back slowly rising and falling and his face was smushed into his pillow. He looked so damn cute, it wasn't even funny.

Rebecca came back and handed him a cup of tea on an elegant ceramic plate, which he took and thanked her for it. She sat back down and pushed her red hair back, taking a deep breath. "I wasn't his first owner, actually. His first owner wasn't exactly… the nicest individual. The reason why I say rescued was because the guy that previously owned him actually had a criminal record and was also physically and verbally abusing Loki. He was only a pup at the time, and he had put up with such bullshit for one whole year. Excuse my language, I just get really pissed whenever I explain this."

 _And rightfully so_ , why would a person even want to harm a living anim- waiiiit why was he even asking this question? The damned owner was _human_ , for crying out loud; a species that isn't even conscious of how trash they really are. Rebecca still continued. "That is kinda why Loki is super duper shy, even him coming to you was surprising to me because he would never actually do that so quickly, I'd have to coerce him to be comfortable around another visitor. He wouldn't be down here if this were a year ago, he'd run upstairs and literally _hide_ if someone even rang the doorbell. He's getting better though, and I am very proud of him." She smiled at Loki, who was just sitting awkwardly silent because he had nothing else to do.

"Did this previous owner of his have something to do with his eyesight?"

That question actually made Rebecca's eyebrow twitch, she was accessing memory as she responded to him. "He did." A pause. "When the cops had found him, there were security tapes littered in his basement. At the time, I was looking to adopt another dog and one of my friends were a part of the case, and I wanted to see the tapes. It took him a good day to give in to my request, and he warned me of it too, but what I saw…" She shook her head; it was out of anger. "The guy would hit him with pipes, there were times where Loki was bleeding, and he would yell at him and would either keep him in a dark room or, if it was raining, just lock him outside if he ever 'did something wrong'. Loki is also _terrified_ of the dark because of this, and he is slowly getting rid of his fear of rain over the years. At one point, his owner sprayed something into his face and that had damaged Loki's eyesight. I don't remember if it was some sort of mace or another chemical but _ugh…_ it was just a horrible sight."

Zamasu looked down at Loki; he could never _ever_ imagine _this_ dog to be abused in the way Rebecca described. Even though Loki was really quiet, just the utter trauma that was associated with his past was unbelievable. He could imagine Rebecca had a hard time getting him to assimilate into her home. "Sitting here and listening to this is making me angrier than when we spoke about humanity."

She nodded in concord. "I myself don't even like speaking about this, and it's occasional in which I do, people usually don't press the subject of his rescue if I mention it." Loki started to go towards Ollie, who was sleeping soundly, and he laid against the floor in front of him. "It was difficult… at first, trying to keep him calm, because he used to have very bad anxiety, and it kept me awake at night because he was always restless and was too nervous to sleep. Now, he literally sleeps almost all the time." She chuckled, bringing a little humor to the story. "He actually bonded more with Ollie earlier, and when he saw that Ollie was comfortable to em, he started opening up to me more."

Zamasu became acutely aware of the amount of effort Rebecca puts into Loki and his wellbeing. He had to commend her for that, even though he hated humans, but this was a very confusing situation because he was _seldom_ okay with her company. "That's a good thing to hear. I think he enjoys where he is now."

"He definitely does. And he's actually really fun to be around, but he sometimes accidentally makes messes. He knows I won't castigate him for it though, so the most he does is cover his eyes and make a whiny noise." She laughed. "And by the way, that asshole owner is in jail."

"That's even _more_ relieving to hear." Zamasu smirked. "He deserves it wholeheartedly for hurting Loki. Speaking of which, was 'Loki' the name you gave him or…?"

"Ohhh that's the name I gave him." Rebecca said, Zamasu realized he had not taken a sip of his tea yet. "The criminal didn't give him a documented nam, nor any claim to ownership of Loki. So when I got him, he was literally nameless. After a while, I saw how he was and called him Loki because that's a cute name, and he's very cute and innocent. See?" She pointed to Loki, who was still laying in front of a sleeping Ollie. He stood up and sat next to Ollie's bedding, and then he started tapping Ollie's head with his paw. It took Ollie at least half a minute to fully wake up to Loki's taps, but when he did, he shifted in his bed and started pushing Loki's paw away from his face while slowly getting up. Zamasu snorted at the interaction. When Ollie caught sight of Zamasu again, he literally bolted towards the green Kaioshin with all this abrupt energy and pounced onto his lap and started licking his face again.

"O-wh-hey… oka-" Zamasu couldn't even speak, and Rebecca started laughing, even as she told Ollie to stop licking the green man's face.

"Ollie, what did I tell you about licking everything you come into contact with." After about like seven licks, Ollie turned to Rebecca and tilted his head all the way to the side. Loki didn't even attempt to sway Ollie's attention from Zamasu, he just sat there and watched. "You can stop showering him with your affection now."

Zamasu couldn't help but chuckled, even though his face was kind of wet. "I think this is a part of him being really comfortable with me, isn't it?" He picked up little Ollie and placed him on the floor. "Wait, what time is it?"

"Ooh, I don't even-" she looked at the clock, while Zamasu quietly facepalmed because he could have looked at it on his own, but he didn't and instead decided to ask Rebecca even though there was a giant, functional analog clock that was right across the room. _Smart one_. "It's 4:50."

" _Really?!_ " Why is he even getting so shocked? It doesn't even matter, at least he spent four hours away from Irene's house, but he spent all that time with another human being. A human being that was _well_ associated with Irene, even considered her best friend. And the scariest thing about it is that he actually _liked it_. Maybe it was because of Ollie, who happened to be more than likely Zamasu's newfound weakness, that led him all the way here. That was more than likely the reason because Zamasu did not like humans enough to like Rebecca at all, that makes perfect sense. If that's the case, then why would he give in to the plea of a dog? It wasn't even a plea, it was just an invitation that could easily be declined, and if that wasn't the case, why did he get so perked when he found out that Rebecca shared the same views as him? She was human too, for crying out loud, why would he share similar views with another human being.

That brings another question; how could they share the same views? How is it that he could hate an entire species, and relate that with someone who also does, and is from the _same damn species_? Was he going insane or something?

"Yup. Why, did you break curfew or something?" Rebecca smirked. "I'm pretty sure Irene doesn't mind you visiting my house, she won't get the wrong idea."

"I didn't-" Zamasu stopped when he noticed a mischievous glint in her eyes. It literally stayed there for like one second, and then she laughed, unable to hold the expression any longer. "What was that all about?"

"Ohhh, don't worry about it. I'm just being stupid." She stood up and swung her hair back. Zamasu raised a brow, but dismissed it either way. "You can leave if you have to. Ya know, go back to the part and sightsee again. Ollie won't drag you by your leg this time…"

Her statement was false, because Ollie was now underneath Zamasu's leg, pushing it forward so that Zamasu would stand up and play with him. Zamasu looked down and under his leg just to address Ollie. "Why are you doing this? You just woke up." How did he get comfortable with a dog in less than a day? Ollie now left his spot under his legs and looked up at Zamasu excitedly.

"...He actually wants you to play with him. Oh geez…" Rebecca found their interaction far too adorable, and even though she knew Zamasu would rather be anywhere than here, she lowkey didn't want him to leave. She knew Ollie definitely didn't want him to leave, that was indicative from his whining noises he was making now.

"What do you want from me?"

Ollie 'ruff'ed.

Zamasu frowned. "I want to leave, you know that already."

Then Ollie barked, as if saying _No you don't, stay here and play_.

"No, I am not going to play with you." The pug whined and tilted his head while pouting. Zamasu pursed his lips, since when did he become this soft for cute things?

Rebecca laughed. "Listen, you two sort that out, I'm gonna go take a shower. Ollie," Ollie turned to his owner, "if he doesn't want to play with you, then next time, okay baby?" She then jogged upstairs and into her room.

Ollie looked between Zamasu and the stairs twice, and then he looked down at the ground. He was even pouting downwards, and Loki sat right beside him and started to nudge his leg. _Great_ , the Kaioshin rolled his eyes, _he knows how to guilt-trip me_. "Ollie, this wasn't my plan; I wasn't even supposed to be here. So I'll play with you next time." But when will next time be? Zamasu was certain that he would never come to this house again, even though he has another 11 months on Earth. What if this is the last time Ollie would see him? Why does he care, in the first place? It's not like Ollie sitting there, pouting and sad because the Kaioshin had to leave would affect the apprenticed God at all, he was far too old and mature to even fall for adorable things, he shouldn't even be considering Ollie's playtime at all.

And then Ollie looked at him, giant chocolate brown eyes giving him a final plea to play, and Zamasu swallowed because dammit, he wasn't going to give into those giant, brown eyes, and that pouty, tiny puppy face. The Kaioshin mentally cursed himself for keeping his right palm facing upwards, because now Ollie placed both of his paws in his hand while standing on his hind legs, gradrupeling the overall cuteness of his pudgy face.

Long story short, and with a lot of mental defiance, Zamasu soon found himself on the floor with Ollie on top of him, and Loki just sitting on his side, almost as if he was contemplating joining the two of them. At least he tried.

† **º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†º†**

You ever taken a shower, and just stood or sat there, contemplating life and thinking of random stuff or doing random silly things? Rebecca had a bad habit of doing that.

She didn't plan for her shower to be over _45 minutes_ , but apparently it just so happened that washing her face and body wasn't the only thing she'd be doing. As the water ran down her slender boy, her thoughts went from what happened with her clients early on in the week, to a certain mishap that had to do with Ollie and Loki. Surprisingly enough, she didn't think Ollie would influence Loki that much, to the point where these two are literally partners in crime. A few days ago, Rebecca returned home to find Ollie and Loki both running away to hide, which is unusual because they would always run up to her if she returned home, and a bunch of Ollie's favorite snack scattered all around the kitchen floor. Ollie doesn't get those treats every single day, she keeps them above her fridge, which raises the question of _'how did those two figure out how to get up there?'._

Well, it's not like they knew how to bring the treats down without causing a huge mess.

When she asked who made the mess, they both didn't raise a single palm. They wouldn't even _tell_ on each other; that is the type of bond that Rebecca likes, but she had figured with those two it would be a major Catch-22. But then Loki looked down and Ollie covered his eyes because they both were culprits of the mess.

Those treats were about an 8-mile drive to get, and she just bought the entire pack several days before the incident. It didn't help that Ollie spilled a bunch of water on the spot where most of the treats were located. _Sweet move_. She wasn't mad or anything, it was just endearing to see how they both felt guilty at the same time.

Hopefully, she reckoned that Loki would get used to Zamasu if he were to visit again, and that was very probable with the way Ollie would jump up and down at the sight of him. It made her wonder why he even reacted that way though, because whenever a person is normally good-hearted, Ollie would do that. But Irene would tell her about the amount of horrible things he would say about her species (some of which she low-key agreed with), and how Zamasu would smile once every rainbow-friggin' moon in her words. Despite that though, Irene told her, Adrian, Jay and James to keep cool, not get upset, and be patient with him. Judging from their last conversation at Stone Cold and today, Rebecca really did see that he was predominantly a nice person, the only thing that makes him look like an asshole is his view on human beings.

That brought up another question; although her grievances were kept in secrecy, did he take his bit of knowledge the same way she did? Rebecca isn't like the girl she used to be in high school; in fact, she was once the popular girl, but now she could concretely say that she had no physically close friends. Even though she really did not like the way people treated each other in general, it wouldn't help if she became mean as a result. Maybe that's what Zamasu is like; maybe he holds back on exerting his irritation because he knows it would do nothing to alleviate him in the long run. Such would be hypocritical anyway.

It's not like she developed her sense misanthropy just _because_ she was lonely. She became more… aware, per say, of the world around her. Senior year was a huge turnaround in her life; she started eating healthy, abstaining from all meat, her inner circle got smaller and smaller, until she had one person that still stayed close to her; that person was Irene, and Adrian technically, because they did date throughout junior year. She refused to reflect on those times.

That was basically the tidbit of her wandering thoughts while she was in the shower, which were cut short when she realized she probably spent an hour in there. Turns out it was 45 minutes, so it's not _that_ bad. Rebecca changed into a clean pair of sweats and a crop top, she didn't wear a bra because why the hell would you wear a bra all day at home? She figured Zamasu had already left sometime during her shower, so she'd be okay without it on anyway. Her red hair was in a lazy bun, and it looked horrible unlike Jay's; sometimes she wonders if he puts effort into his lazy buns, because they always looked so perfect. She decided to leave it as it is, and made her way downstairs, already hearing the sound of possibly Ollie and Loki both moving around in her living room.

She most definitely was not prepared to see some green dude, namely Zamasu, the tall kaioshin apprenticed God, laying on the floor with a smile on his face as Ollie playfully tackled him, while Loki walked around the two as if he were a referee. Zamasu didn't even notice she was coming downstairs, so when she whistled the trio stopped like three deer caught in headlights. Zamasu had this serious look on his face, trying to reinforce his diplomatic persona but that definitely would not work for anyone would was underneath a 12-inch pug. She opened her mouth to speak, and then started laughing, unable to place the words that were in her head due to how adorably funny the scene was.

Zamasu, on the other hand, was not fond of a human being catching him wrestling a small pug, so he sat up quick as hell and wanted to speak, but didn't know how to rectify the situation without having Rebecca laugh any further, so he just sat there and scowled at her. She finally calmed down and pointed between her dogs and Zamasu. "So you two were wrestling? Who won?"

Zamasu was definitely not answering that question, but Loki raised his paw and placed it on Ollie just to answer her question. A really tiny and 'immature' part of Zamasu wanted to argue that he was the victor, but Zamasu dismissed that thought because that was not like him at all. "Your shower was far too quick."

She snorted. "I spent 45 minutes in there, okay. It's 5:56 right now."

Zamasu looked back at the clock and by the Gods, she was right. So now he has to sit here and confront the fact that he spent 45 minutes playing with a dog; he, Zamasu, a Kaioshin that's thousands of years old, much older than any human living on Earth concurrently, found solid entertainment in playing with an animal. This will definitely count as him losing his sanity. "..Oh…" He literally had nothing to say.

"Hey, don't take it so heavily, bro. You had fun, I'm not gonna make fun of you for it, even though it was kind of cute." She smiled, and it was a really warm smile, Zamasu looked down at Ollie and then at Loki and back at Rebecca, and started to smirk-

Wait, why the heck was he smirking? That warm smile of hers should have no effect on him whatsoever; was staying here slowly making him softer? That cannot happen, not in this world or the next. "Well, I think I should take my leave." He looked at Ollie with a facial expression that said 'You will not change my mind this time, so don't even try it'. Surprisingly enough, Ollie didn't fight back this time, and Zamasu stood and went for the door.

Rebecca assumed his reaction was because he never really 'loosened up' before, let alone had a witness to see him have some semblance of fun. So he went to the door and opened it for him. "Thanks for coming! You could always visit again, I have no problem with you in my house. Just don't come early in the morning while I'm asleep because I might throw a shoe at you. I don't like being disturbed while I sleep."

Zamasu raised a brow. "I wasn't really planning on coming back either but-" his stupid eyes accidentally went to the two dogs who were now standing right behind Rebecca. "-it may or not happen…" He shook her hand. "Goodbye."

"Bye Bye!" she waved as he walked out the door, and out of her marvelous garden. When he heard her close the door, he decided to take flight again. He'll have to look for Irene's house once again, which was a farther than usual but he found it with ease. Landing down slowly, he took the biggest possible breath, because he knew he would be faced with an irritating rat with a brain capacity equivalent to a rusty bent nail, and he did not want his positives vibes squandered once again. He decided if she were to annoy him, he'll just completely ignore her; matter of fact he'll just ignore her regardless. He rung the doorbell, and clasped his hands behind his back comfortably. The door opened and he was met with Irene's paint-stained face and torso. She smiled at him.

"You're back, I dunno where you went but I kinda wasn't expecting you to return." She moved out of the way and allowed Zamasu to walk in, which he did silently. He silently walked up the stairs and silently opened his room door, but when he sat down on his bed, his sigh was really long. He wasn't sighing because he was tired, hell it was in the middle of the evening as of now, he was kind of sighing because umm… _I actually don't know why I'm sighing, why am I signing anyway?_

He literally went the entire day questioning why he was saying this, or why he was doing that, or why he spent _more than two hours inside of another human's house_. What was wrong with him?

It must be Irene's food, he damned, cursed eateries making him and his judgement and decision making all skewered and numb like humans and their decision making skills, if they even had any. Maybe it's because he's been breathing too long near people on this planet, and it's _actually_ dumbing him down, he might end up being stupid within a year's time- _How insane am I really?_ How could such lowly beings come close to having an effect on him? That's near impossible!

Actually, it's not impossible. And Zamasu will find that out really, _really_ soon. Almost _too_ soon for his completely comfort.

 **l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l**

 **Zamasu did not expect to find someone who shared the same viewpoints as him, and it just so happens that that same person is a human as well. Do you see how conflicted this man is?**

 **Well aside from that, he did meet Ollie and Loki, and I'm not one for spoilers, but this won't be the first and last time we'll be seeing these three together.**

 **You'll be catching more of these chapters soon, there is a lot of material to cover sometimes, I don't really have a set dateline on when I finish these chapters so they just come through randomly xD. See y'alls on the next one!**


	10. Justice Is Served

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 **Justice is Served**

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K. Greinhardt's Hospital was unusually crowded today as a result of a huge collision that happened not even eight miles away from the large building. Of course, there were many other smaller and local hospitals that were closer, but since this hospital was one of the most prestigious ones in the world, and their ambulances got there much faster, those who were injured were sent here.

Two days right after Rebecca had driven and walked Ollie to the park and had an encounter with Zamasu, she was called up urgently in order to assist the many doctors that were now employed for the day. This happened right after she found out about the accident, which involved two large trucks and three other cars on a very busy road. One of the trucks did hit head-on, and it made the hovering vehicles explode, sending debris and shrapnel flying everywhere and hitting 70 people, 55 of which had severe to near-fatal injuries. The drives miraculously were alive but in critical condition, and those on the intersection adjacent to the crash had second to third degree burns.

This was the worst part of her job; she didn't hate being a doctor for she loved helping people, but she hated seeing bleeding and wounded people hastily being wheeled in one by one. Of course, she's been in this job for years now and was far too intelligent to waste six more of her years in medical school, but sometimes she still couldn't help but show remorse for those who were hurt severely. And being involved in surgery, _part-time_ mind you, meant having to swallow any disgust you'd feel if you saw a limb dangling from someone's joint.

It was around 9:30 at night, the accident happened a good 11 hours ago, there were still a dozen or so people who need medical attention. It didn't help that her being the youngest of the hospital's top-tier doctors was known by every single person within the establishment, and by her natural persona, she tried getting to as many people as possible. Every operation that was needed has been done successfully, at one point she had to remove a silver piece of sharp shrapnel that was dangerously close to a man's aorta; removing that little piece alone took about half an hour. She had finished running about, and assisted many doctors in about 40 or so operations, and she checked up at least 20 people.

You may not figure or know this, but Rebecca was actually _super intelligent_ , and not only even in book smarts but she looked into the psychology of people and their brain mechanics, so if anyone needed something crucial and tedious to be done with their heads, she was almost always called up. She had graduated out of college within two years with the knowledge of some aleck who been in med school for twenty plus years. It just so happens that she soaks up information like a sponge, and has been working as top tier positions within this hospital. If you had known her in her earlier high school years, you wouldn't get the impression that she was smart (mainly because she wasn't at the time), and you'd probably think she was mean and stuck up for being both pretty and popular. It was weird because not only was she anything _but_ mean, but people were far too steeped into the belief that popular people were assholes, that they canceled out anything generous that she has ever done. They only based her personality on how many people were friends with her.

And friends, they _were_. They were when they wanted to feel included in the 'giant gang' of well-known kids who secretly used each other for popularity points. She was in the midst of needless drama, but she never got into it that much. And then junior year came; she started dating Adrian, she stopped dating Adrian, certain things happened, and then everyone that she's had an empty conversation with had left. Those people aren't big names at all now, save for Irene, Adrian, Jay and James, for the five of them were successful in their lives.

Someone tapped her shoulder, and she turned around to face another fellow doctor, Dr. Terry. He was several years older than her, and had co-oped with her for many patients. "There is a patient that wants to see you."

"They want to see me? What are their injuries?" She did not register the question completely, as it was the _patient_ who wanted her and not the doctors who needed her to go check on a patient. She's spent so much time running all over the place that anyone who had spoken to her would be translated as 'somebody needs your medical attention'.

"No, as in they just called for you. They were hurt but they wanted to talk to you."

"...Ohhh…" That's weird as hell, she started walking in the direction that Terry was pointing. Clearly, her mind was so set on doing her job, she just let her voice trail off. And then he touched her again, and she turned to him.

"Aren't you tired?" Terry wore a concern expression on his lightly aged face.

 _Yes_. "Well not really, I mean I'm still like, fine so far." She could yawn and fall asleep on the floor right now.

Terry frowned. "You told me that you didn't eat anything for breakfast when you came here. It's nate at night and I haven't seen you go out for lunch; even France said you could leave."

"I mean, I'm not _that_ hungry. I'm good, really, swear on it." And then she finally registered the last part of Terry's sentence. "Wait, France said I could leave?!"

"Yes… he told you, to your face, like an hour ago." He leaned forward to emphasize his point, and also to emphasize how utterly exhausted Rebecca was. "Look, after this patient, you can go back home. We all will take over from here, there's not that many people flooding in anymore."

Terry was like the older brother that she never had; he always was concerned for her health; even though she was a prestigious doctor, Rebecca was known for giving herself to something a little too much. It may not be good for your health, and she knew that, but she couldn't help it. "Okay, okay-I'll go home after this. Are you su-" Her stomach growled so loud, that two nurses walking past even paused after hearing the sound.

Terry straight-faced. "Go home, _eat_ and get some rest."

"Are you the manager?" She jokingly punched his arm, and it was at that moment when she realized that she was kind of weak. This is what happens when you don't eat breakfast. "Fine, fine, I'll go home after I get to the patient. What room is he located in anyway?"

"Room I-95 N."

She nodded, bid him a 'thank you' and 'goodnight', and she made her way hastily towards the room. There has not been a moment where she was walking the second she got here, she probably forgot how to do so anyways. She opened the door slowly, and greeted the person while looking back at the door to close it. "Hello, you called for me?"

"Of course I did."

She stopped. She didn't even turn around. That voice sounded _eerily_ familiar, and she came to her sense and decided not to show what she had felt the second his voice hit her ears. She turned around to face a brown-haired man. He was considerably tall, but then again anyone could be because she's really short, and he was laying down on the hospital bed which a really weird crooked smile on his face. He always had that crooked smile. She decided to address the bigger problem within the room. "Let me find the logs for your injuries, I'm sure that one of the doctors left them here for convenience sake."

"That isn't why I called you, Rebecca."

The fact that he still remembered her name made her inwardly shiver, his voice was deep and it wasn't threatening, but it wasn't something you'd like to hear when he was upset. So she decided to focus on her sole job so that she can leave. "I need to check your logs, sir."

"You know my name already." He sat a little straighter on his bed, looking directly at her and she accidentally made eye contact. He had these intense eyes that were prone to giving away his emotions really well, and right now, there was a deep-rooted anger buried within them, but it was subdued by both his voice, his calm demeanor, and his crooked smile. "Do I need to remind you?"

"No you don't." She was now in front of the holographic screen, and nearly cut him off with her reply. "Let me check your logs, because my shift is nearing its end, and get the necessary doctor for you." She would never tell a patient that she was done with her work, but this particular person was not someone she'd trifle with. Saying his name would make her feel, unadmittedly, scared.

The man adjacent to her goes by the name of Merkel Gerard. The only reason they knew each other was because he was kind of involved with the situation between Loki and his owner, who had murdered someone, and Merkel was present in court to see the delinquent judged as guilty. Ever since then, Merkel had found out that Rebecca would take the rights to own Loki _legally this time_ , and he used to _bother_ her over it, to put it in nicer terms.

"You know I was near one of those cars when they exploded, right?" He spoke steadily, due to his injuries and his relations with her. "I was all bloody and bruised at the event. But everybody saw it, everyone witnessed the crash with their own eyes."

"They did, Merkel. This better not be about something that took place _three years ago._ " She knew he was still trying to justify the other man's actions of murder, saying that no one else was watching the murder would not conclude the fact that someone was killed.

"It may be." After that he started fingering the vials attached to his arms. A pause, an uncomfortable silence, and then he spoke up again, the hate in his voice more vehement. "You put my brother in jail."

"No I didn't."

"I'll never forget you for what you did."

And then Rebecca got fed up. She got fed up with him _that_ quick, because she had nothing to do with the murder case, and everything to do with Loki's life. For some stupid reason, she figured he made the correlation between her owning Loki and his brother being put in jail, which there was virtually none. The only connection would be the abuse tapes that she decided to look at as part of the evidence to the man's abusive nature, but even that did not amount to what the man really did. She stood up and looked at him. "I had nothing to do with your brother going to jail. Maybe you should question why he murdered that other woman _before_ getting pissed at me."

Right now, her teeth were almost gritted, and she was holding onto the table tightly to strain her anger. She absolutely _hated_ murders, and hearing of people dying. The fact that Merkel completely dismissed the crime his brother was accused for made her blood boil. Merkel on the other hand was just as upset at her, and he sat up to prove his point, if he had any. "You think you have the guts to talk to me like that? Do you see how big I am, I could fucking body you if it weren't for these injuries." He literally had his fists clenched. "Just because you're a little Miss Doctor's over there in your white coat doesn't mean you can spill your shit at me, you little bitch. Learn your fucking place."

If she was anywhere as truthfully ruthless as Jay, she would have broken his jaw already. What place does he even have that's _above_ hers? They aren't even in the same league, and that's another thing Merkel was angry about; the fact that Rebecca was both rich _and_ successful while he wasn't. She could have rebutted back, but she decided not to stoop down to his level, and instead left the logs for another doctor that was more than likely available. She was nearly seething at this disgusting person, she turned sharply to address him. "Your _physician will coming soon."_ The second she left that door, she heard him say three simple words that racked the fear back into her once again.

" _Just you wait_."

She exited and had to hold in the shiver that would circumvolve her body, she quickly called on another doctor and quickly assigned him to the room in which she came out of. She bid her goodbyes, left a few notes in regards to the patients who also bid her goodbye as well, and left the hospital. _Hastily_.

She would not dwell on the fact that Merkel was more than likely involved with criminal activity, judging from how he dismissed murder and got upset at her, and she would not dwell on the possibility that her life would potentially be in danger. There were too many probability words to even be worried about that in the first place. She was damn near a millionaire, she had enough security on her had anything went down. And besides, he doesn't even know where she lived. Why stress over some jaded guy when she had enough defense on her side anyway? The only being she was worried about was not really her, but Loki. Merkel definitely _wishes_ he had the rights to own Loki, and if he gets a hold of _her_ dog, _I'll be out for fucking blood_.

She had to steady her nerves while she was driving. If she didn't she'd risk another repair bill on her car, even though that doesn't happen every five or so years. She had a pretty good credit, but sometimes her emotions would be out of whack and it would stall her focus on driving. It sucks even more because she's naturally reserved, so she doesn't usually tell anyone her problems or whatever she wishes to keep secret for two reasons: for them not to be worried, and because she'd rather not have others know her business. Both go hand in hand, and it leads her to venting to her dogs sometimes. They always sit right beside her and look at her as she's getting frustrated and try their absolute hardest to make her feel better. If it's not Loki cuddling really close to her for her comfort, it's Ollie attempting to make her laugh; they always succeed at their missions regardless.

She arrived home within thirty minutes from the hospital. Even as she was turning the key in her door, as she took off her shoes and hugged both her beloved dogs, as she went upstairs to strip down and take a shower, and as she was _in_ the shower, she debated on whether or not she'd tell her best friend. Irene was the only person she confided in _most_ of the time; she's naturally secretive, but she did not tell Irene that the man had a brother, and that that brother had been pestering her at any chance he saw her for three years. She also didn't tell Irene the full story of Loki's rescue, she told Zamasu and it probably seems like a huge disservice, but at the time she got him she was far too reluctant to speak on behalf of Loki's salvation, partly because she felt so much for him at the time. That's what happens with her and animals, she bonds so well with them that the bond goes beyond words.

It's kind of sad to think that she had never had that same connection and kindness from other people. It always seems like despite her best efforts, it always goes unappreciated. And she had a knack for exhausting herself for the sake of another person, and they always never say that she does. They just sit there and take all the uber-positive treatment she showers them in, and then when they are bored of it they leave. It's a horrible cycle.

She ran her hands down her head, which was lathered with cinnamon-scented shampoo. She couldn't try to think of the possibility of her best friend doing that too, which is definitely not going to happen. They are inseparable by default, she didn't confirmation for that at all. She didn't know about Adrian and Jay; in her mind, Jay more than likely wouldn't want to get close to her because of Adrian, and he was actually one of the people who _didn't_ use her. The only thing is, she was certain that he didn't like her, but not to the same extent as Jay. Jay is one of those people who you literally have to _prove_ yourself to be friends with him, he has high expectations of those he's with. It's not that he's following the same thought process as Adrian, it's more of her and him not speaking to one another due to her thinking that he's taking Adrian word-for-word.

That probably made no sense, but it does in Rebecca's head. She was sure that Jay was a kind person at heart, he's just brash and feisty.

She didn't spend a long time in the shower this time; she got in and out within 15 minutes. She could've been lazy and not taken a shower, but the hospital smells a certain way; she wouldn't want to sleep with the scent of a hospital on her body. She changed into sweats and a see through lace sweater with no bra on because- we've already went through this before, why would you want to wear a bra in your own house?

She decided she was gonna actually whip up something to eat before she'd sleep and wake up the next day in hunger-agony, so she decided on an avocado salad. She already picked out her fruits and veggies the day before (having a homemade garden was actually her idea, it took some time and lazy points to convince Irene to do the same), so the extra work was unneeded today. Once she finished, she sat down in her living room and turned on the TV. Both Ollie and Loki went to go play around somewhere upstairs, she was tempting on calling them down for the sake of company, but then she decided to call up someone that she hasn't contacted in about… twenty two hours. Her TV had the ability to call up and stream other people so she didn't need to get up and get her phone. The other person took about five rings or so before they answered.  
"What?"

Typical Jay-response. He doesn't answer the phone with a 'hello' when he's busy. It's even more vehement when it's Rebecca on the other hand. "Hey, Jay."

Sounds of very light shifting were apparent on Jay's line, because his phone has an exuberant mic and sound system. That thing could pick up anyone _whispering_ from across a room. "Yeah, hi, what do you want?"

He didn't sound as annoyed as he normally would when she called him, and this was something she did more often. She used to be far too reluctant to speak on behalf of their unspoken 'rule'. A light giggle escaped her lips, partly from not taking his voice seriously and from slight nervousness. "I don't want anything. I kinda just wanna… talk to you, you know? How are you doing?"

She could _feel_ his straight-faced expression. "What is there to even talk about?" There goes his irritation, it's finally budding into what it usually was.

She took a deep breath; she didn't even know why she'd be afraid to talk to him in the first place. Okay, it's not really fear, it's more of her being nervous because Jay was predominantly… _dominant_ , and feisty. "Well, I just wanna discuss some things with you." Things that have been sitting in the back burner of her mind ever since she met him. And these things need to addressed because it was lowkey killing her on the inside and she needed to know why-

"Okay. What do you wanna discus-" He was cut off by the sound of something dropping. " _Sick_ , you made me drop my spoon." Rebecca frowned, and then laughed.

"It's not funny."

She instantly stopped laughing, his voice got super serious. Then he repeated himself again. "What do you want to talk about?"

She sighed vocally, and looked down at the carpeting of her rug. Her toes kept curling inward and outward and she was pulling back a few strands from her head. It shouldn't even be this hard to ask a simple question in the first place. "Why do you hate me?" She said it in a rushed voice, and now she was toying around with her fork.

There was pause on the other end, and she anxiously waited a full second for his obvious reply. " _Please_ , what do you mean?" He knew what she meant. "I don't hate you at all."

She frowned. "Well, you always seem to look like I annoy you even though we barely ever talk, Jay. You avoid eye contact with me and you didn't answer my call yesterday.

Jay leaned back into his chair, drumming his fingers against the table. "First of all," Rebecca crossed her arms as he spoke, "you have to keep in mind that I'm a music producer, okay? I can't always get back to you because I'm primarily _busy_ , that's number one. Second," She took that into consideration, "You're conflating me a little too much, don't you think?"

She tilted her head. "I'm not, you literally do that when I'm around you. Even Irene asked what was wrong at one point."

"You mean like a year ago?"

She stayed silent, because he was right. Other than that one time, Irene has been silent on the interactions between the two. "Well… yes…"

"Look, honey," even though he wasn't being endearing at all, his use of 'honey' was not degrading either. It's something he does when he wants to get a point across for a topic that he feels is frivolous, and his voice sounded really attractive whenever he says that. Anyone who has heard him speak would say that his voice is definitely one of the most attractive things about him, other than his super-Alpha male personality. "I don't hate you. Me hating you would require me to literally abstain from anything you're involved in, Irene invites me to a lot of places, including her house, with you involved. Now have I done that yet?"

"...No…"

"So you see? I don't do that because I hate you; I don't hate you at all, I just don't like you."

He could make anyone feel horrible and even cry with his cutthroat attitude.

She decided to make her sitting position a little bit more comfortable, so she laid against the soft armrest of her couch. "That's what I just asked."

" _No_ , you didn't just ask me that. What you asked me was if I hated you, and I said I don't."

He had a point there, but now it raised a lot of more questions. "Then why don't you like me?"

There was a golden unspoken, and unwritten rule between her and Jay and her and Adrian respectively; they do not speak to each other on behalf of what happened in the past, or why they refused to keep in touch with her _most_ of the time. Right now, she was about to break that same rule, and Jay more than likely could have hung up right now, but to her surprise she heard him sigh. "Why does it matter so much to you?"

He answered her question, but he didn't answer it they way she sort of expected him to, and that was a fault on her. She learned not to have expectations of him because he either completely topped those expectations, or he'd completely dismiss them. "Well, I'm friends with Irene, who's friends with you and Adrian. Adrian and I knew each other a long time ago and I'm just wondering if that's the reason why you seem to just… not like me?"

"It may be." How could someone give a simple answer to a question that _begs_ for explanations? Before she even got a chance to rebuke, however, he continued on. "I kind of don't have a thing for holding grudges- okay, I'm kind of lying -but what you did is not something that can't be forgiven that easily-"

"That was _years_ ago." She could tell Jay was holding his tongue, otherwise he would have sliced her statement for cutting him off. "Why do you still hold on to that? I was a different person back then- you weren't even there, for crying out loud."

"You aren't any different."

Rebecca didn't have an instant rebuttal because he said that with so much _weight_ and authenticity that her gradually rising voice became quiet. "I-I am. I've changed."

"No. You haven't." Does he think he's psychic? "You may have went from the school's unfortunate popular girl, to one of the most intelligent brains in medical science, but you're still the same person."

Now she was actually getting offended, because the old her used to be kind, but beforehand she was extremely manipulative and abrasive. Rebecca purposely would get others' into trouble had they messed with her the wrong way, and she also didn't give a rat's ass about anyone else's feelings; even Adrian, who ended up leaving her because of it, and when that happened she didn't really care either way. He was one of the people, probably THE only person she's ever been intimate with, and when he left her she didn't cry nor did she feel guilty because she was ungrateful and arrogant. How in the hell did that compare to her now? "Since you're psychoanalyzing me, obviously people _can_ change," she jabbed at his integrity with that one which she had to be careful with, she was actually kind of afraid of this conversation ending and Jay's overpowering persona makes her nervous. "What makes you say that I'm the same, hmm? I'd like to hear from _you_."

"Because you don't know how to handle anything that comes to you."

A pause. She even didn't even hear him drumming on the table anymore. "...What? The hell does that mean?"

"You're still very unconfident, you know that right? You did all that you've done in high school because you thought that nothing would ever come to you if you weren't either pretty or had a nice sounding voice. Now, you cover your inability to feel good enough by doing overly nice things for people, trying too hard to be kind, and then retreating back into a hole when you're tired of it." Jay stood up to put his empty fruit cup in the garbage, and then he leaned against the counter. "And then when you finally get someone who actually gives a damn about you, you use them and then leave them in the dust, and then you wonder why people do not go near you."

She couldn't tell if she should be angry, or shocked. How does someone tell another about themselves as concretely and as confident as he did? It's as if he knew her for years, even though they barely freaking talked. And that was what started to piss her off; the fact that he felt he could just lay down a monologue on her and her personality, even though he never tried to get to know her in the first place. "You don't even talk to me. We don't even communicate: on the phone or directly in front of one another- we never _fucking_ talk. You have no idea who I am, you just don't like me because of a grudge you're still holding over something that you didn't experience!"

The fact that he stayed cool and collected upsets her even more. "I don't have to call you every single day to know that you have a problem with yourself."

Again, he always managed to catch her off guard with how low-key elaborate his words were. He was at God-level when it came to speaking, he knew just what to say and what not to say. "Sure you don't, but can you at least _try_ to get to know me before you judge me, you asswipe?!" Now she was about to start yelling, and more than likely would curse him out if he continued to bring his smart-ass thought process to the conversation.

"You haven't denied what I said yet." She could tell he wasn't smirking, but she refused to recollect the entire conversation just to argue with him.

"Yes I did!"

"You just went on about me not knowing you, and me not trying to get to know you. You shouldn't be this upset about what I said if I was wrong; all you have to do is say 'No, that isn't true' or something along the lines like that. I didn't get a concrete answer from you. Refrain from calling me an asswipe, too."

Her eye twitched. "You're being one right now. Obviously I'm going to get upset because you described me in a horrible fucking way."

"But is it true?" Another pause. "If you're upset at what I'm saying, then it obviously must be true."

"It's… it's not." She said that after like ten seconds of pure silence, during which she wondered how he hadn't hung up on her yet.

"Why are you stuttering?"

"I wasn't!"

"Then say it again. Say it's not true."

"It's not true." Inadvertently, her voice was weak when she said that. "I'm not like that anymore. I don't take advantage of people."

"You're missing my point; you do the absolute most for others' confirmation. Have you ever taken the time to consider how you felt for a change? I may be rich, but money doesn't hide even the deepest of your insecurities."

He's hinting at the amount of times she would invite everyone to a fancy restaurant, or to any place in general, which would sometimes be more than twice a week. On the days where she isn't working, she's either busy on something else, walking, talking to Irene, or just sleeping. "Oh, so I can't be nice now?"

" _You know exactly what I mean_." And she did, but she didn't feel like that was the case at all. And even if she did, she would have refused to dwell on it. She wouldn't do that when someone who was not _afraid to say what's exactly on his mind_ is on the phone with you. "You asked a question; there's your answer. Is that all, now?"

Rebecca looked down at the floor. "Well, you ruined my night."

"Obviously." He was still being a dickhead. "It's kind of concerning that nobody told you this, but I guess that's what happens when you smoke-screen everyone with treats and gifts."

There is no way any person alive at this moment could have an argument with Jay and win. It wasn't like he was trying to make her mad, she understood that but by default she was going to get upset. He's far too brash and bold for someone to _not_ get upset when he speaks on something sensitive. It's scary that he even knew that this was the first time anyone has ever laid words on her this hard, but that's how Jay is. Maybe… maybe he doesn't hate her as much as she thought he did.

"I can't help but be generous all the time." Rebecca now supplemented her confidence back, but Jay didn't need to deny her or argue with her just to know if she was genuine or not.

He did this chuckle, which would've sound really sexy had he not just pierced a hole through her in the past ten minutes.

"I'm sure you can't. Goodnight." And then he hung up.

She closed the call, and stared at her TV screen for at least half a minute. He had a thing for hurting her feelings, him and Adrian concurrently; it still didn't make sense as to why the two still didn't like her… shouldn't they move on from that? And why would whatever Jay proclaimed the reason to be end up as a reason for them to ignore her existence? Now she was conflicted, every time she tried to contact these two, she'd always end up in a conflicted state. But since Jay answered, and actually said a lot more than 'I'm fine' or 'Hello' or something, she really questioned just how much Jay had been ignoring her all this time, the exact opposite can be said for her.

Truth be told, she had been very interested in the Asian male, he was always a mysterious person. And everyone who knows him knows that he has a great sense of humor, was also not afraid to get whatever he can earn, and was assertive or aggressive if he wanted to be. He was a nice person under all of that overriding confidence, it's not arrogance at all either, he is really humble but if you aren't someone he can vibe with, he can easily phase you out without any emotional regression. That same trait was what made it super hard, currently, for girls to date him just for his money. He can spot a gold digger from a mile, nobody could come near his inner circle. That was somebody she could have been, and somebody she could have been _with_ , if what happened in high school did not happen and if her past social life did not become the predecessor of her current social life. It kind of sucks that he's so damned smart, he had the entire package times _ten_.

Rebecca looked at the time, and realized it was 11:54 at night. All of the sudden, she realized how tired she was, and decided to call it a day. She almost completely forgot about Merkel's fat-belly ass earlier because she was so invested in her conversation with Jay. She stood up tiredly and went straight to bed, completely forgetting her bowl of avocado salad on her coffee table, uneaten and untouched.

"You're being really stupid."

"There's no way that I'm not."

"Yes you are! How can you do what you just did if you were thinking?!"

"It's not that bad of a spill, Zamasu. Chill out."

The last thing you want to do to any being whatsoever, is tell them to chill or calm down. The stain on his gi won't go away if he just decided to relax, and that's not what he's gonna do if Irene has to actually touch him with her dirty-mouthed hands. That made perfect sense in his head. "How clumsy could you possibly be?"

So here's what happened; Irene and Zamasu spent the entire day and night- okay not the entire day, but a really long time -arguing over really innocuous stuff. Within the past three minutes, Irene managed to make him nearly bust a blood vessel, raise his voice, and spill tea on the torso of his gi. If this day gets any worse, the whole dining room will be covered in blood and entrails. It's not like she made his tea either, _noooo_ ; he made it himself, she took his cup into her hands and managed to move a little too fast, and it ended up on his right breast.

"Listen, I didn't mean to actually spill that on you, okay? It will dry off in like less than half a hour, it's not that big." She was dabbing a napkin against his chest, and it was pissing him off greatly that she was this close to him, not to mention she was making physical contact with him, for crying out loud.

"I think a better response for this would be to apologize, you idiot." She didn't even say 'sorry' when it spilled on him.

"Okay, alright; _sorry_." She stopped patting the stain, and went back into the kitchen. Luckily, she did so, otherwise he would've grabbed her hand, and twist it so far back that her bone pops right the heck out. He wasn't playing any games, so he stood up and went behind her right before she turned around and jumped at how _vehement_ the anger in his eyes were.

" _I won't accept that way of apologizing. Correct your tone, woman."_

She frowned. "Sorry… what more do you want from me? I already apologized-" she tried to move to the side to escape his death glare, but he put up both his arms against the kitchen counter so she was stuck right below him.

" _Apologize_. _**Correctly**_."

This was the closest she felt to fearful in a long time, because he legit looked like he was going to kill her. But she swallowed it down, and decided to correctly apologize to him. "I'm sorry."

He gave her a long, hateful look, and then he turned around and walked away. She was still frozen in her spot for like two seconds afterwards, but then she exhaled, which can out as a sigh, and went back to the living room, not tempting to make a rebuttal at the Kaioshin who was now in her backyard.

Zamasu really, _really_ did not want to be here especially. He seriously wanted to go somewhere else, to some random place. He decided to fly upwards until he saw a clear landscape of the entire region, including the city on the upper right. With a clear breath, he zoomed forward at tremendous speed, and deciding to hem a little bit of surprise into this damned year-long 'session', he would randomly land whenever he didn't feel like flying anymore. He didn't know how long he was flying, but when he landed it was super late at night. It should be around 1 AM at night, and where he landed wasn't… where he expected to be.

First of all, it was in an amazingly large field, like a meadow, the wind was relatively cool. The grass was around his knee at height, there were some dandelions that would blow their pretty, fluffy feathers into the wind, and there was a lot of fireflies glowing and pulsing at random. It was honestly beautiful.

Zamasu could have flew somewhere else, he could have found another area just to waste time, but he decided to lay down and rest his palms underneath his head. He closed his eyes and allowed himself to drift off, and wake up whenever he would eventually wake up.

++(++)++(++)++(++)++(++)++

Late in the morning, Irene spent her time finishing up (not really) a piece of artwork that has been sitting in her _Creative Vault_ for two months. She had woke up at around 8 AM, do not ask why because she didn't even know, and decided to spend that time enacting an on-and-off routine of checking her phone, eating a few light snacks, and painting. This project was actually really big; it spanned a good nine feet in length and around five feet in height, composed of a vibrant, positive meadow gleaming happily in the sun. If an observer stood within the landscape painting, the grass would reach their knees, they'd be surrounded by random flowers, ranging from sunflowers to dandelions to camaras. In the far distance, they could see trees and a mountain far ahead, and the sky was a serene calm blue.

Well, at least that's what the observer _would_ see when she was done, because right now that whole entire portion of the painting is just white.

Surprisingly, in all her five hours doing art, her mind had traveled in every possible metaphorical direction you could think of, except of the Kaioshin that was supposed to be in her backyard, or in his room as she sat here. Even though she pissed him off by spilling half a teaspoon of tea on his gi, that can't be something to make him leave the house for more than 12 hours. It's not like she's worrying about his safety either, he's a God in his words, he'll be able to fight if he had to. And now that the notion was brought up, she wondered where exactly he was, hopefully he wasn't hurting another person just because of how bitter he is.

Her phone rang, she had to take her brush away from the canvas even though she kind of jumped from the ringtone, despite it being at a pretty low volume. The caller ID was Rebecca, Irene answered in a heartbeat. " _Heyyyyy_."

There was a long yawn on the other end, and then a groan. "Good morning, 'Reniee." Rebecca sounded like she was stretching. "How are ya doin'?"

Irene snorted. "Rebecca, it's like 1:30 in the afternoon right now. You left the hospital late yesterday?"

"Umm… kind of…" her voice trailed off, and then she picked it right back up. "I left at around 9:30. Spent eleven hours in there running from room to room and writing down things and staring at vials."

"You've been there since the accident occurred?"

"Well yeah, I saw a snippet of it on the news, and then they called me in real quick. I didn't even have breakfast yet." She chuckled.

Irene frowned. "You ain't eat anything and you spent nearly half a day going all over a huge _hospital_?" Rebecca suppressed a sigh, because her friend was going to start maternally reprimanding her again. "I know you want to help everyone, but please don't starve yourself like that again. I hope you ate something when you got home."

Rebecca started to fidget because Irene's statement mirrored the same exact thing that Jay told her yesterday, except less deep and painful. She also fidgeted because she realized that her avocado salad went completely untouched the entire night, meaning she was still empty-bellied. And once she had realized that, her abdomen decided to curse her out physically by growling really loud; _painfully_ loud. She stifled the groan that threatened to escape her mouth. "Umm… I did eat something."

" _Bullshit_." Irene shook her head. "Go eat. Go make something and eat now before you pass out on me or something."

Rebecca swung her legs off the bed, and stood up slowly so she wouldn't get dizzy. Sometimes when she didn't eat that much, especially if she's been active the entire time and didn't have enough food to support her energy level, Rebecca would catch vertigo. It isn't that bad of vertigo though, but it would nice to _not_ have that right after you wake up. "Right, I will. I just was tired yesterday."

"Geez, you slept before you got chance to eat?" _She must've been really exhausted_ , there's no way someone could sleep on an empty stomach.

"I didn't sleep well yesterday. I laid in bed, but I was too tired to go back downstairs and eat so I like… laid there until I slept." That was a lie; she didn't sleep because what Jay said, as well as her conflicted emotions, were what kept her up at night. Sometimes brutal honesty is something you yearn for, and once you get it you forget how to function normally for a few hours. "But I'm gonna go get something to eat and stuff- don't worry."

"For sure. By the way, you didn't run into anyone you or we knew in the hospital, did you?"

"Nope, not at all. Luckily, nobody you knew." Rebecca didn't stress the 'you', because she still hasn't told Irene about Merkel, and she refuses to because it's innocuous yet kind of concerning. It makes sense in her head. She didn't push the topic any further, but she asked Irene what she did yesterday. The woman explained the usual, she woke up, she'd work on a piece, and then she'd make food to. When Irene started talking about Zamasu, the red haired woman had another question in mind that was burning to be asked while Irene spoke.

"- and he kinda just left yesterday night. He still didn't return either." Irene now stood up to go and wash her hands in a nearby sink. Her art room had almost everything she needed, including running water which is essential for half of her works. "I have no way to contact him, but I'm sure he'll come back or something."

To anyone else, it might sound like Irene genuinely was concerned over Zamasu's whereabouts, but it's more dismissive than active-worry. Apparently his reaction to her spilling tea on him definitely rubbed her off the wrong way, in fact this whole week she's been rubbed off the wrong way. That was what Rebecca was seeing, and hopefully Irene will remember her own words of being patient, because as gradual as it seems, her patience was slowly starting to run thin. "Wait… he left?"

"Yup, just went into the backyard and then left. I dunno how, but he did."

"Oh geez." This might be something more common of him since Irene hasn't given him boundaries or something, but she can't do that because he's not a child. "I don't think he'll end up here again."

"Hmm?"

She was mumbling, but then caught herself and quickly corrected her statement. "I hope he doesn't end up on someone else's property, ya know?." She stopped to think; why was she so amped to keep her and his encounter a secret? It was weird, she didn't think to do it, it was instinctual. "I'm pretty sure he's fine. He's probably coming back as we speak."

× **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** × **•** ×

Why was he surrounded by five human men?

And why were they all looking at him like he killed their uncles? Not like he _couldn't_ do that, but still.

Zamasu had left the meadow not long ago, and he started walking near some woods, apparently catching eye of five buff and aggressive men who were a little too hype to pick a fight with him. Let's back up for a second; Zamasu was walking peacefully when these mean caught sight of him and one of them whistled to catch his attention. Zamasu closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and turned to the group.

"Yo! What th'heck y'doin' in my woods?" they were mumbling and snickering to one another, Zamasu just raised a brow.

"You know you ain't supposed to be here."

He watched their attempt to be threatening to a young God like him; Zamasu was pretty sure that he was done with traveling after this. "I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to be here, either."

One of the guys got offended, somehow, by Zamasu's lack of fear and ever-growing annoyance. "Oh, so green boy's got mouth, eh?"

"You don't have th'rights to talk to us like that."

And then one of them balled up their fists, all angry or something like that. "Do we gotta kick you out? Don't make us kick your little ass, sonny."

He was debating on whether or not to make their deaths slow and painful, or if he should just end them off right on the spot. The beer bellied male pulled out a pistol and aimed for Zamasu's chest. He pulled the trigger, and smiled at the sound it made as the shell left its barrier…

Then his smile, and everyone else's aggressive look, fell apart when Zamasu swiped his hand across his chest, and the bullet did not pierce through him. They all stood there dumbly and Zamasu smirked and raised the hand that was just over his chest, revealing the bullet in between his two fingers. "You really think a gun can be of suitable offense against me?" He tossed the bullet to the side, and took a step forward. All five of the males collectively took a step back. "You all must be out of your minds."

One of the males had a fanny pack on, and he literally blinked at least five times, trying to register what just happened to him. "Uhh Scott, I think I'm a little too high for this right now. Did he just…" he pointed slowly at the approaching Kaioshin. His question was never fully stated because all of his friends took their plunges and ran at Zamasu.

The first male with a beer shot the last three rounds, which did not hit Zamasu at all, and decided to throw the pistol at the Kaioshin while running to punch him in the stomach. Zamasu slapped the gun away, and grabbed the man's fist, raising it up, and giving the man a _promising_ punch to his stomach. The second guy attempted to side-step and hit him from his back, but Zamasu turned in time to kick him square in the jaw, then he kicked him sideways, sending him toppling over one of his friends. The easily offended man was now red in the face, and he went at Zamasu with a series of punches and side jabs, all of which were dodged in ease. Zamasu decided to stop his tirade with a finger raised to a fist that was meant to hit his face. He elbowed his chest, and then sent him flying into a tree. Zamasu scoffed at how easy it was to take them down, he didn't even (and refrained from, for his own sake) have to kill them to stymie them completely. There was only one left, the man with the fanny just stood in his same spot all through the innocuous fight. Zamasu smirked and tilted his head, he decided that he wasn't going to waste time with this man either.

So the Kaioshin took him by the arm with his ki, and launched the man into the air. He went flying off to Zamasu's right, and the grey-eyed male didn't waste time to look at him any further. _I'm done for the day._

He landed back at Irene's backyard in a short amount of time, and opened the door which led to the kitchen. Slowly stepping in, he realized that the entire house was quiet, and there was no sign of Irene. The second he closed the door and took a relax sigh, the sound of a ring assaulted his eardrums. He looked to the kitchen counter, there laid the source of the sound; Irene's phone. He didn't know how to turn the damn sound off, so he tried everything he could; he knocked against the back of it (he facepalmed afterwards), he tried pressing buttons on the side of it, and then he slid the green button to the right of the touch screen. He could have been relieved, until he heard another sound, and he placed his ear to actually see if it was coming from the phone.

"Irene? Irene, you gotta see this, my gosh."

He blinked, frowned, and tilted his head. "Umm…" What was he supposed to say? "This is not Irene." _Smart move_.

"Ohhh, Zamasu." Rebecca was on the other end again, this time she sounded a bit hyper compared to her earlier demeanor. "How are you? Umm, I kinda wanted to tell Irene something, I dunno if you could work a TV. I didn't even know you could answer phones."

She wasn't insulting him, he didn't even know he answered the phone. "This... was kind of a mistake."

"Ohh, well… that makes sense." Rebecca's voice sounded really nice over the phone even as she giggled at Zamasu being clueless with phones.

"What are you doing with my phone, mister?" Irene now had her hands on her hips and she was standing at the front door after having opened it. Zamasu braced himself for the irritation that would soon come.

"Apparently, I answered it, and Rebecca wants to talk to you." Rebecca giggled again, and Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "Stop giggling at me."

"What? It was funny." Rebecca shrugged.

"Just… you," he gestured to Irene. "Take the phone and talk to your friend." Zamasu held out Irene's phone for her to grab and Irene did so with pleasure.

"Becca', what's up?" They had a small conversation, and Zamasu took this time to brew and make tea for himself because why wouldn't he? It was his way of calmness and tranquility.

"Irene, turn on the TV, to the news. Like now." She was being serious too. Irene turned around and sat down on her couch. She pressed a button on the armrest, which connects to the TV, turning it on and changing the channel. The news anchors have transitioned to the reporter when she ended up on the news channel.

"Yes, just earlier today, we've caught a rather mysterious and confusing scene right before the skies of West City near the parks- a man was flying over _a hundred_ feet above the ground, before landing into the lake within the park that I'm standing in. Witnesses saw and took pictures and videos of this, and it has been circulating all over the Web in the past hour. Here's the footage caught on camera."

"What the fuck?" Irene frowned. Zamasu was now curiously standing behind the couch, and his attention was on the flat screen TV in front of him. They now transitioned into the actual video of the man so-called flying, and surprisingly to Irene, they weren't even exaggerating. There it showed a male flying through the sky, and people within the park had their eyes glued, recording the incident and pointing at the man as he flew. Zamasu frowned; he didn't think that humans had the ability to fly.

"Is this for real?!" Irene was now laughing. "How the hell did he get there?" Zamasu could hear Rebecca laughing along with her and sharing just about as much confusion as she did right now.

The screen now showed two split screens of both the reporter and the news anchor, who was now speaking in amusement. "I actually thought that this man had a glider or something to fly, but this guy was flying through the sky."

The reporter laughed. "It almost looked like he was thrown, because if you take a closer look, the man was rotating as he flew. We'll go ahead and zoom in on here." The screen then went to a paused portion of the footage, which was in high resolution, and zoomed in on the male's body. The guy had his mouth opened, as though he were screaming, and he was also wearing a fanny pack.

 _...Wait, no…_ Zamasu's eyes widened and he sipped his tea _super_ quietly.

"What makes this even _more_ ironic is that the said man who was flying was none other than George Samos, the same man who was suspected of killing two little girls about two months ago. Police have been trying to find this man for weeks, and he was caught in plain sight. Before he was taken in by police officers, we decided to ask how he even ended up in such a predicament."

 _Oh no_ , Zamasu slowly backpedaled into the kitchen just to put his cup down against the counter. He was still able to view the TV, because a part of him wanted to see what George had to say. The TV cuts to a damp looking George who had a traumatized expression on his face, along with incredulity.

"I-I-I didn't even know but like… there-there was- I was in the woods," he kept gesturing as he spoke; he's literally telling on himself. That's how shook he was, "and just… this green person comes in and-and I tried to fight him, but then he beaten the absolute shit out of the guys he was with, and then he-he just took my hand and threw me into the air. I don't even- I don't even know anymore."

"Green dude? Who did h-" Irene paused, and slowly turned around to look at the Kaioshin who was now standing behind her kitchen counter with an _innocent_ look on his face. He looked at Irene and his eyes went back to the TV while sipping his tea. Irene put her phone on speaker and Rebecca accusative voice was heard.

"Zamasuuuuuu."

He blinked twice. "What?"

Irene's eyes were slits. "You deadass threw a guy across an entire park and into a lake?"

"No…" _Yes_.

George was still talking, they didn't ask for a description of the perpetrator aka Zamasu either, he just continued on. "He had like, like white hair and grey eyes and he was just all smug and-and… he looked like a green fucking Power Ranger or some shit, this guy, this person was fucking strong as hell."

"WHO ELSE COULD THAT POSSIBLY BE?" Rebecca exclaimed, and Irene gave Zamasu a look.

"He and his friends thought they could fight me." He answered calmly.

"So you had to _launch_ him into the sky?" Irene stood up and leaned forward. "Welp, now people will recognize you as the green dude who threw a man into a lake."

"Well, on the plus side, you _did_ catch a criminal in the funniest way possible so… Justice is served!" Rebecca laughed.

"Oh, that is true, oh my god." Irene cracked up, and Zamasu just stood there, smiling, because after he learned that George was a murderer, he didn't feel the need to ensconce the fact that he casually threw him. Justice was served, indeed.

"Bravo, bravo, Zamasu. I'm proud o'ya." Irene slow clapped.

"You guys do realize that West City is about six miles away from your house, right?" Rebecca took a bite of her salad; she made another one even though the salad from yesterday was still sitting on her coffee table, because she was a genius. "Zamasu, where _were_ you when you threw him?"

"I was in some… woods." Zamasu looked down at his cup.

"There are no kind of woods near West City! The nearest one is like two miles ahead of the city!"

Irene's eyes widened. " _That's_ how far you threw him?!"

"Umm…" he didn't think that he threw him that far. He definitely didn't think the man would land in a lake alive, either. "Apparently."

Irene snorted. "Thank you for showing me this, Rebecca. Now I have another name to call him whenever he gets pissy with me."

 _And here we go again_. "Excuse you?"

"I can call you trebuchet now, or Green Rocket."

What is wrong with this woman? Why is it her unsolicited job to irritate him? "The heck is that supposed to mean?"

"You don't know what a trebuchet is?"

"I _know_ what a trebuchet is."

"Then there we go."

"I'm not a trebuchet nor am I a Green Rocket, you wench. I am Zamasu."

"Okay, okay…" she nodded. " _Zamasu the Trebuchet_."

"Alright, I'm done with you. That's enough." He approached her with the intent of hitting her, until Rebecca's voice interrupted his actions.

"So, this is what you were talking about Irene? If I gotta list you two down for domestic abuse then I will." She giggled. "Please don't hurt her, Zamasu. She's my best friend."

Zamasu looked at the phone. "If you cared about your best friend, you would tell her to keep her mouth shut."

"But that's not fun." Irene still had her arms raised with a smile on her face.

"Was I talking to you?"

"Not really." _How disrespectful_ , he was reminded of the lack of diplomacy that this woman had despite him spending more hours outside of her house than in.

"'Ey listen, I gotta go, Irene. Zamasu, by the way," she purposely made this known to her best friend. "Ollie misses you. He's been picking at his green bedding whenever he wakes up." Irene looked at the Kaioshin.

"You met Ollie already? You've been in Rebecca's house before?"

Zamasu scowled, and grabbed the phone from Irene's hand. "Didn't I tell you to not tell her about that!"

"I didn't tell her about the you rolling on the floor with him, so it's okay if she knows you've been to my place." Unfortunately, Rebecca did not know that Irene's phone was on speaker, so she heard all of that and was now laughing her ass off.

"HE WAS ROLLING ON THE FLOOR?" Irene clutched her stomach. "When was this!?"

"Like, two days ago."

"STOP TALKING!" Zamasu actually yelled into the phone, which made Rebecca and Irene quiet down because he had never raised his voice that high before.

"Okay, okay, okay, I'll stop." A giggle. "I'll see you two later. Bye Irene, bye Zamasu." She still even as she hung up. Zamasu placed the phone on the coffee table, and Irene crossed her arms.

"So you have a soft side for dogs, now?"

He whipped his head at her. "Shut up!" And then turned around, storming off towards and up the stairs and into his room. Irene didn't even call him back, she just sat there and continued laughing at her newfound discovery. Zamasu was the last person, she'd expect to be that comfy around any _thing_ on Earth. He was definitely the last person she'd expect to be at someone else's house being that comfortable with another human being near him.

 _Well, you learn something new everyday._ Next time Rebecca was coming over, she'll remind her to bring both of her dogs just to see the silly side of the Kaioshin.

/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\l/l\

"These are by far the best memes I've seen all week." James and Jay were both sitting in a large motel, laughing their butts off at the jokes the Web would make pertaining to George Samos' arrest story.

"Yo, what does it say, what does it say?" Adrian ran out from the kitchen with a glass bottle of juice in hand.

"'When you think that you'll get away with crime but life keeps throwing you off." They both snorted, and Adrian kissed his own teeth.

"That is the absolute worst way to get exposed." Adrian took a sip out his bottle. "Like, you get suspected and looked after for murdering someone, and then you're finally found just flying across the sky where everyone else could see you, and then you come out of a lake and get automatically arrested."

"It was two people, two little girls. But still, he came out looking super traumatized, like- look at this one!" The meme Jay was looking at showed George's traumatized face, and the caption said 'When you get caught red handed and try to make up an excuse knowing you're still fucked'.

"Did you guys even peep the news?" James was looking at his phone. "Apparently, the guy was thrown by some green dude, that was in his own words. Look, look." James showed Adrian George's exact response, word-for-word, and Adrian nearly spat out his drink.

"Wait, hold up… green dude?" Jay turned around. "What did he look like?"

"He deadass said 'white hair, grey eyes, tall and… looked like a Power Ranger- wait. _Waiiiiiit_." James paused.

Adrian busted out laughing. "HOLD ON, HOLLLD ON! SO YOU'RE TRYING TO TELL ME, THAT THIS GREEN GUY IS ZAMASU?! YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT HE THREW A CRIMINAL _ACROSS_ WEST CITY?"

"Holy shit…" Jay turned to his co-producer. "RIGHT? Because I'm looking at this and as I'm reading this I'm just like… Wait, no." He cackled. "There's no way."

"But, didn't Irene say that he hated people? So I mean… technically it was reasonable, but how the fuck did he end up near West City? And why was he there in the first place?" James took Adrian's bottle and took an air sip, much to Adrian's chagrin.

"Exactly! Oh geez, I hope Irene sees this. Yooo…" Jay propped his forehead against his fingers, scrolling and reading through the memes and gifs of Samos flying.

"My guy turned into Hercules." Adrian and James collectively laughing. "You see how he was wailing through the air? It reminds me of that one tournament that we watched."

"The one where Hercules got kicked and was just flying off the platform?"

"YES!" All three of the men laughed loudly, so loud that a particular person who happened to be upstairs was stomping down to where they were. She had a pillow in her hand, and she threw it at her boyfriend's head.

"Adrian, please keep it down! I was taking a nap!" The brown haired woman approached the trio.

Adrian cocked his neck back. "Why are you yelling at me only?"

"She's your girlfriend. You're responsible for all that noise." Jay smirked, and dodge a playful punch from Adrian.

"Matter of fact, all three of you should keep it down. What's so funny, anyways?"

"Ashley, you _have_ to hear this." James approached Adrian's girlfriend and gave her a brief summation of what happened to a criminal.

Her eyes went wide. "What?! Lemme see, is there a video of it?"

"Here, look." Adrian showed his girlfriend the video, which she was stifling her laughter.

"Oh my god, that's not funny. He could have gotten hurt really bad."

Jay turned to her. "That's George Samos, Ashley. He's that criminal guy the police were searching for; he didn't die, he just landed into a damn lake."

"Oh, it was _that_ sack of shit? Okay, never mind, this is gold."

The Asian male stood up. "I'm so done, that just brightened my day."

James looked at him. "Why? Were you angry earlier?"

"No, today was great, that just made it ten times better."

Adrian kissed Ashley on the forehead. "We gotta go see those two after this gig, just to rub this in their faces."

Jay and James agreed, the basketball player looked at Jay. "Bro, how come your girlfriend isn't here with you?"

"She's busy. She can't join in the fun because she's gots lots of work to do." Jay took a sip out of Adrian's bottle, and Adrian glared at him.

"Are you guys gonna stop drinking my juice?"

"I'm not." Jay pretentiously smiled at him, and Adrian grabbed a pillow to throw at him.

"I actually asked her if she was free, like three days later, which I'm pretty sure is when your gig ends, and she said she would be free the day after we get home." Ashley said.

"Hey, at least she would be. I have never even seen Jay with her." James sat back into the couch.

Adrian didn't even whisper. "You guys, between me and you, Jay is the biggest softy around his g-"

"I'm right the fuck here, Adrian. Shut your mouth." Jay yelled from the kitchen.

"What? I can't tell them how much of a _sweetypie_ you are with Lexi?"

This is the part where Jay starts chasing after Adrian in attempts to make him shut up, because 'sweetypie' was the name that Lexi often calls him whenever they were together. The only reason why Jay was now running across the motel just to get Adrian's ass was because it sounded so cringey when his best friend said it, and also because no one else knows that Jay wasn't always that badass, tough guy that everyone knew. He wanted to keep it that way; the only people that knew his soft side was Adrian and Irene, somewhat.

"You know what, we'll just leave it with these two chasing each other. This is what they do on a regular basis." James held out his hands like he was presenting something beautiful to behold.

Ashley laughed. "Yep.. we'll definitely leave at that."

 **l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l•l** **‾** **l**

 **I honestly** _ **enjoy**_ **writing Jay's dialogue, it is probably one of the most entertaining things to construe besides this entire plot. He over here just gently snatching edges and not apologizing for it XD. The story is expanding a bit more, there are gonna be more people you'll be hearing about, some of which are definitely gonna be prevalent throughout the story; like Rebecca's potential stalker. The plot will continue to get more and more normal, I promise...**

 _ **I'm lying, nothing is going to be normal from here on.**_

 **I'd like to hear what you guys have to say, because I DO read all the reviews, trust. Some of y'all come up with pretty good additional ideas for the story, and some of your comments make me chuckle. Feel free to leave a review… or two… or three… Or** _ **ten**_ **. X3**


	11. Concretely Discreet

**A guest once said that innocuous is my favorite word, so I made a self-pact to use it in this chapter more than five times. I don't know how, but I ended up failing said pact.**

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 **Concretely** **Discreet**

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A month…

A month has passed, and it felt like ten decades.

Zamasu spent an entire _two months and three weeks_ on Earth. He had learned and experienced so much in so little time, especially within the last month. Along with (unadmittedly) finding out he was very fond of Ollie and Loki, and him unintentionally getting some criminal arrested with the constant joking of the crew and apparently the story circulating the Web like wildfire, he would be lying if this was an absolute contrast of his actual home; the Shinjin realm. The only difference is that the Kaioshin realm didn't harbor a bunch of humans, all of which annoy him. Especially the one who Gowasu has given him refuge to, _Irene_. It's as if her goal was to make him kill her.

He was even surprised that he hadn't laid a hand on her in all that time; he should have, so then she would stop talking to him, or stop talking altogether, in fact. Usually she would play around and tease him, but as time passed, he noticed she was actually getting a bit aggravated at his lack of consideration. Anytime they'd argue now, she would always find a way to cut it short or to leave before he would try anything with her. That was not the woman that he had first met, who would kept going until _he_ left. Now, it was the other way around, although there were attempts made by her to detense the stress between the two. She would engage in small talk out of nowhere, trying to get a word or something akin to information on him, but he either dished her off, deeming her attempts boring before they even started, or he would tell her to straight up leave him alone. Whenever he did that, it was after they would argue, and he'd still hold a grudge on the incident and wouldn't want her to utter a word at him for a long time. And she would leave him alone, she'd take his order with a grain of salt and leave him to his own thoughts and beliefs, until one day she actually snapped…

 _A little._

This particular day wasn't that long ago; it was actually less than 24 hours ago, yesterday night. Zamasu was sitting in his room, reading a book like usual. He had a God's habit, doing the same thing over and over for a prolonged period of time and wondering why you weren't doing something else in the process. He heard two small knocks from his door until it finally opened to reveal Irene's fluffy head in a sleeveless black jumpsuit. She appeared to have been running or doing some sort of exercise, because there was a very light bead of sweat that marred her face. Although she smiled at him, Zamasu remained neutral.

"Hey…" she then leaned against the door opening. "Dinner's ready, if you'd like to come down."

At this point, Zamasu has been in a 'hermit phase', because he didn't go anywhere while Irene went out with her usual crew, or some other people she knew. He just stayed home and didn't speak much unless he was arguing with her. She knew that he didn't want anything to do with her and her pathetic, temporary and short life, yet she still continued to bother him with needless questions. So he felt that she didn't deserve an answer from him just to make his point clear.

But she didn't leave; even though he was silent, she stepped into the room and sat on the side of his bed. He gave her a side-eye glance from his book, and returned his gaze to the literature in his hands. "Can you tell me why you're giving me the cold shoulder, now?"

"I've given you the cold shoulder ever since I met you." His voice wasn't cool, it was cold and stoic.

She blinked. "Yeah but… _why_? I'm asking why don't you just… open up a little bit more? It'll make things easier for the both of us."

He inhaled deeply, turning the page of the book slowly. "Because there is no need to." She still sat there and she had her head cocked to the left, but didn't say anything. She didn't even move. "Leave."

A pause. Zamasu didn't even look at her. "No."

With that response, Zamasu lowered his book and looked at her. "What do you mean no?"

"I said what I said." She didn't sound like she was teasing him either. She was dead serious.

"Why is it your mission to irritate me?" He tapped against the book's hardcover. "Have you forgotten that I am a Kaioshin? I could end your existence in an instant."

This is where he saw a rare emotion from her; annoyance. Actual, concrete irritation coated her face like a deep mask and he frowned, almost offended at how _she_ could possibly be annoyed when _she_ started to irk him. Irene crossed her arms. "Okay, you _can_ , you've said that for the absolute longest and at this point, I am getting really really fed up with this."

She was holding her tongue, Zamasu didn't move at all. "You don't think I've been fed up with _you_ this entire time? Perhaps you finally see just how much of a pest you really are." His attention went right back to the book. "You're not accomplishing anything trying to redeem yourself with this futile attempt of trying to 'build bridges', in your words. I have no interest in wanting to know how _irritated_ you are, nor do I care about you in general."

Zamasu kept his eyes on the book, but he stopped reading after five seconds of his speech. He can feel the _heat_ radiating off of Irene's body and now, she was getting angry. He blinked and looked at her.

Before he could even open his mouth, Irene fired back. "Look… I don't know what your deal is- wait, I do know. You've spent damn near three months in my house. I've been nothing but nice; I didn't hurt you, I didn't fuck any of your shit up, and you know damn well that all those names I've called you shouldn't even be something to get all mad about. I didn't abuse you in any way, I make you food every single day, I give you access to read books off my _fucking_ shelves, I let you go wherever the fuck you want, and _this_ is how you repay me? By being an asocial _prick_?"

She put so emphasis on the last word, and Zamasu just sat there unaffected, unwavered, and completely nonchalant. "You think it's perfectly fine, what you're fucking doing. You didn't come here to shit on me and order me to do all kinds of shit for you- last time I checked, your mentor put you here to _experience New horizons,_ but you're too fucking ignorant to take part in that, and instead make everything ten fucking times harder for me. You have no respect for any fucking body!"

Zamasu glanced down at the book, placed its respective bookmark in the page, and closed it gently. He placed it to his side, _gently_ , and then he _gently c_ lasped his hands together. No need for wasting his physical energy, right now.

"I have respect for beings that are respect _ful_ , and you aren't. With the way you act and speak, you shouldn't even be highly regarded by anyone else." His statement wasn't so gentle.

"And that gives you the right to treat me like shit?" She was finally taking his behavior personally; it's funny because he'd do this to anyone who pissed him off, it just so happens that she was one of them. _How sad_.

Not really.

"I would have beaten the hell out of you months ago." He leaned forward. "If I wanted to, I could have killed you. But I didn't, at the courtesy of my mentor, I wouldn't want to stain his name by wasting time ending your life. Consider _yourself_ lucky, woman."

She literally froze, and sat there in shock. And then her rage came back, and she seethed. " _You ungrateful piece of shit._ "

His ego was pretty big, but it wasn't big enough to leave a statement like _that_ undefended. Grey eyes went wide, appalled at her choice of words. "You think you're far ahead and higher than everyone else just because you're a different species. You're a fucking God, you aren't supposed to act like you can't handle a _little_ imperfection and a few fucking flaws. You should fucking know better than to be so damned arrogant, ignorant, and disdainful to the same race that _you_ said acted just like _that_. You act _just like_ the same species you parade your hate on… and you don't even _notice it_!"

And then she abruptly got up and left, all the while taking deep breaths as she stormed out of the room. He didn't go downstairs to eat, either. He really didn't need to. That's what happened yesterday. Not even 24 hours ago, at night. It was in the evening today, and Zamasu was sitting in his room with no book in his hand. He kept tapping his fingers against his nightstand for Kami knows how long, staring down at the ground. His fingers propped up his chin, and the look on his face was pensive… just because of yesterday. He was supposed to let it roll off his back, and not think about or dwell on it for more than ten seconds, but for the past _fifteen_ hours, Irene's angry bout ran through his head whenever it possibly could. And he didn't even have much to think about, so it stayed with him almost constantly.

No, it did affect him. No, he wasn't offended by what she said either. He spent fifteen whole hours dismissing and revitalizing her monologue over and over and _over_ again, and every time he did it, it rubbed him the wrong way even more.

Is this what insanity feels like? The weight of her words built up even more, it led to him standing up and walking _around_ his room in thought. Why was it so bothersome? Maybe because he isn't ungrateful, and he isn't arrogant, and he definitely isn't ignorant. She had no idea who he was, and had idea who she'd potentially be messing if she continued to berate him any further. There is really no need for him to even be thinking about this, so he decided that he wasn't going to. He'll just do whatever he was doing prior to those thoughts, and completely forget everything that had transpired last night.

 _I not concerned with any of what she said at all._

And downstairs, at the heart of the living room, Irene wasn't either. She had just finished taking a shower and sat comfortably on her couch, chatting on the phone with a few other artists that she co-worked with. The black-haired woman assumed that everything that she had said went in one ear and out the other, not because he was daft, but because he just didn't care, and that's why she didn't pursue the topic any further.

The most frustrating feeling is that feeling you get when you're deeply upset at someone and they just don't give a damn. So the most you can do is vent and move on, or hold it in until you explode. Irene had done the latter.

To be truthful, this was one of those rare moments in her life where she felt like she was… less than? She didn't know how to describe it, but it was the same feeling she had when she was with her ex-boyfriend, the one before James. That guy would make her do everything for him, and slowly but surely, she became nothing more than a housewife- or _maid_ , for a better term, because she cheated on after a while. That was at her ex's home; Zamasu was legit subjecting her to the same thing in _her own house_. He wouldn't ask for anything, yet he'd call her selfish for not making anything for him.

Yes, that actually happened. He was far too contradictory for the woman to understand.

And when she did decide to make something for him, he'd lose interest and wouldn't come down to eat, nor would he even look at her as he chewed and swallowed her damn cooking. She'd watch from afar, in the kitchen as this attitude kept going on, and at first she let it slide. But as time passed, she had realized that her patience was starting to backfire on her. Sure, he may be a God and all, but aren't supposed to be accepting and understanding as they do know so much, and not be the latter?

It didn't take a long time for her to realize just how little he knew, and his behavior, attitude and mindset all derived from him not knowing and him not knowing how much he _didn't_ know, and not wanting to change that in the process. So who was the ignorant one now?

Will that ever go through his head? It didn't really matter, she was sure that nothing she said would be registered by him, he had such a giant ego that couldn't be deflated by what she said; he was probably sitting on his bed, _that she bought and owned_ , reading a book and not giving two shits. And that was what she would do; completely dismiss the fact that her feelings were tossed out the window.

So now, her and a few colleagues were in the group call, pitching in ideas for their project. They had the basic sketch down; people were drawn in a continuous line, nobody separating the other and everybody was connected, meaning that everyone was the same. The artwork was going up with many other works that have now followed the accidental movement that she _accidentally_ made, all having to do with peace and being considerate of other people. It was going to be pretty large, and would be placed in West City's most prominent art museum. Almost anything that was sent there was worth millions, even billions sometimes, and would seen globally; Irene's works have been there more than several times, and everything they managed to get there, the projects would be worth millions apiece.

It was funny that she started a trend, a creative, artistic trend for that matter. Never before did she expect it to branch off so far, and it wasn't even intentional, but she loved it nonetheless. The best thing about it was getting to see all the other artworks pertaining to the movement.

"Alright, we'll settle our concepts here, and call it a day. We've been talking an awful lot." It was true, they spent two hours on the phone shit-talking and discussing random ideas for their collective project.

"Are we gonna pick it right back up tomorrow?" One of the artists, Camelia, who was a bit amped to continue working with her fellow partners, but was also burnt out and tired. Irene felt the same way too.

"I dunno, I might be a little busy. Like, writing-wise." Ashley sighed. "Maybe sometime during this week, we can schedule a day via text."

"Definitely. That won't be a problem. Alright, I'll talk to you guys later." They all said their goodbyes and the call ended.

Irene laid to her side on the couch. She turned on the TV just to some music channel and was not surprised to see a large EDM gig playing snazzy music with a bunch of people jumping and dancing around, and the two producers that controlled the sound were none other than Adrian and Jay. Even though the event happened a little less than a month ago, it was still playing conservatively, unlike a lot of the songs that would be on constant replay in every music channel. They had returned after that particular concert, visited Irene and their families, and went back to touring. Even though they were now across the globe, the trio still kept in touch via phone.

The last time they spoke was around two weeks ago. She, Jay, Adrian and Lexi discussed different things, and Lexi brought up the stigma between the two males and Rebecca. Jay instantly responded with a simple 'It's confidential', and whenever he said that, you couldn't get him to open up about whatever that topic was. She knew her best friend was very reserved as a person, and _she_ herself didn't even know why they continued to dismiss her in the first place. She got up just to get a snack bar- _actually, two_ \- and went back to her spot on the couch. As as she sat down, she heard a door open loudly from upstairs.

Irene blinked thrice, and looked back just in time to see Zamasu stroll down the stairs calmly. Her anger before was _real_ , and she wasn't playing around when she said she felt disrespected. To see him walk down the stairs calmly actually hurt her a little bit, because there was literally nothing she could do to beat some sense into his head. Irene may be a little strong; of the entirety of her squad, she, Adrian, and Jay were considerably the strongest, but if Zamasu could throw someone across a city, then she'd be better off _not_ fucking with him physically.

He didn't scan the living room, he just went directly to the kitchen. Zamasu took the tea kettle, filled it up with water, and placed it on the stove. He turned on the fire, and sat down on one of the stools in the kitchen, waiting patiently for his water to boil.

Irene didn't say anything, she really didn't need to either, she watched him embark on his journey to get tea, and then turned back to the TV while not really watching it. She just nonchalantly stared out into space. The kettle whistled and she heard Zamasu turn off the fire. She heard the sound of the water being poured into the cup, she heard his footsteps a minute after and turned around to see Zamasu holding his cup with both hands with looking down at it. He approached the countertop where if he looked up he would get a full view of the living room, and then he took a sip from the cup and placed it down. His fingers were still wrapped loosely against the heated cup, and his eyes were still calmly glued to the brown contents of the tea. Irene frowned, and then she decided to leave it at that, and turned around. Each time he sipped his tea, she noticed that the sound the cup made when being placed on the marble countertop progressively got louder, but she didn't pay it no mind because it was so subtle, so she assumed it was just the silence impacting the noise in both rooms.

Until she heard his fingernails drumming against the cup was when she did a sort of side-glance, because she was actually a little confused as to why he was making so much noise. Usually he'd just silently do whatever he wanted, and now he was just standing there staring down and drumming his fingers against the ceramic cup. All of the sudden, without warning, Zamasu turned and stormed towards her, leaving the cup in it's place with his fist balled up. He stopped his angry trek when he was a good five feet away from the woman lying down comfortably on her couch, and just stood there for like five seconds while his shaking fists clenched. Before she could inquire, he spoke first.

"I'm not ungrateful!"

He didn't just say that statement, he more like _yelled_ it out in front of her which made her jump. Irene raised a brow. "...Huh?"

And then he turned and did this semi-pacing thing, while giving her an angry 'I have been thinking for too long' look on his face. "You have _no idea_ what it's like… being a God placed with a bunch of humans. You think you know me enough to use your vertical insults on me?! You do not know who I am!"

It was at that moment Irene realized just how _giant_ this man's ego was, and what's funny about really egotistical people is that it only takes a certain word to make them completely throw their argument off track. She didn't expect him to be upset about what she said because of how little he cared when she it, but he more than likely spent the entire night with it lingering inside of his mind, pressing it further and further until he would finally implode. That just goes to show how empty and needless his ego was, because he truly had nothing to back it up other than insulting humans for just being humans. But Irene wasn't going to say that, nor was she going to bruise that ego any further; the worse she could do was address that when his head is still in his ass. So all she did was nod.

"You have NO right to speak to me in the matter that you did yesterday!" He stopped to point at her. "You had the _nerve_ to use such _disgusting_ words not only in _my_ presence, but directly at _me_! How _dare_ you put such distaste to a Kaioshin's name!"

Irene just sat there quietly, looking at him while blinking.

He was almost seething just as hard as she was yesterday. "You're nothing more than a skin infection on behalf of the gods themselves. Knowing how powerful I am, I should've killed you before you even had the chance to leave my room."

Irene looked down at her snack bar, and sat up from her soft couch pillow. She clasped her hands together. "Why?"

Zamasu frowned angrily at her, answering the most obvious question with the most obvious answer. "Because you angered me. Had you not heard what I was saying, or are you daft?"

She tilted her head, calmly dismissing all the epidemy that ran through her mind. For now. "Why would you want to kill me after I said what I said?"

Zamasu stopped and blinked at her. "I have wanted to kill you ever since I met you, you idiot!"

"Well, I got that," at this point she really didn't care about his statement. She just wanted to get to the bottom of something that she just realized. "But why didn't you care right when I said it, and decided to come rant at me right now?"

Surprisingly enough, that was a question that Zamasu could not answer, because that was something that _he was thinking too_. It logically made no sense, especially given his laconic reaction to her last night. But Irene continued. "You know, you sound exactly like I did last night. I know you may not know it, and you probably couldn't give a shit either way, but I was actually upset at the way you've been acting. So for me to yell at you yesterday, only to see how little you considered my own anger; that actually really hurt. Did you know that?"

She was being _extremely_ calm, and Zamasu just stood there, his tirade went quiet and he wasn't pacing anymore. Although when he looked into her eyes, he could see the amount of stress and frustration that came from him venting at her, which he didn't notice while he was yelling nor did he notice it while _she_ was yelling at him last night.

But she still continued. "And now you're telling at me, and you expect me to be upset and feel guilty at the things you kept doing. I get it, you've said this a million times and then some, that you're a God and that is humans shouldn't disparage against you or whatever. That doesn't mean you can blame me for your intolerance, and that definitely doesn't mean that I'm going to submit to you knowing _damn well_ that it was your fault." Her voice was slowly growing less quiet, and more confident. "Did you think about that at least? Since it looks like what I called you actually hurt your feelings."

The logical side of Zamasu could vouch for her explanation, but he hates humans and he hates her, and he was thinking emotionally right now. "You didn't hurt my feelings." He legitimately scoffed. "Why would I be hurt over the trashy insults you showered on me?"

She answered his questions his question with a question. "Then why are you _here_ , ranting at me and trying to defend you not being ungrateful?"

 _... She's got a poi-_ She has NO point! "I'm setting things straight; you do not speak to me in the manner that you did yesterday."

"I will if you actually listen and _understand_ the things that I say." And then Zamasu gave her this really disgusted look, like the kind of humiliative look really shitty people give to others, only three times more vehement. Irene was almost taken aback, definitely offended, but she wouldn't give the benefit of the doubt of showing such a thing to him. "It's true."

He looked down at the ground and turned swiftly, returning to his spot where his cup sat. He raised it to his green lips and took a sip, suddenly realizing how overly _sweet_ the tea was. It was still good to taste, but it was the kind of sweetness where you couldn't finish an entire cup because the taste simply didn't _feel_ right. Tea is not supposed to be _this_ sweet, for crying out loud. Now he can't even enjoy a nice cup of tea because of how worked up he was, sure he could put more water into it but that wouldn't _feel right_.

Listen, you try serving and sipping tea for thousands of years, You'll find that the stuff starts to grow with you in a weird way.

Irene didn't say anything, she just sat quietly watching Zamasu as he silently griped about the taste of his tea. He then looked up and caught sight of her watching him, and instantly his 'stank face' returned. "What are you _looking_ at?"

Irene laughed. "Why are you upset at your tea for?"

"I'm not upset at my tea. I'm upset at you."

"Oh, so I did make you feel some type of way?"

Zamasu's face never been in so much denial, and his frown never looked so comical. "No, you haven't!"

"I haven't?"

"No!"

"Really?"

"Yes!"

"Are you SURE?"

"YES!"

"OKAY THEN WHAT WAS THE POINT... OF STOMPING DOWN THE STAIRS, MAKING YOURSELF TEA, AND THEN RANTING AT ME OVER SOMETHING THAT HAPPENED LAST NIGHT?" She wasn't speaking because she was angry, she was actually starting to get amused. She even leaned forward and gestured at the stairs then the kitchen as she spoke.

He was leaning against the countertop. "You annoy me! That's why!"

"Shouldn't you be ignoring me, like you always do?" That sounded sarcastic, but it was also lowkey bitter. If someone were watching the two, they'd look like a couple suffering the after effects of the silent treatment.

"I always do! Are you stupid?" He kept leaning further into the countertop.

She pointed up and down at his position. "If you don't be careful you're gonna topple over and fall, Zamasu."

"You think I'm _that_ clumsy? I'm not the one who spilled tea on my gi!" He didn't retaliate either, instead resting his arms against the countertop.

"Oh geez, you're being ridiculous. I apologized to you, it was a one time thing." Irene raised a finger.

" _Excuse you?_ " Like any genius out there trying to debate with someone, Zamasu was now holding himself up with his arms on the countertop, still leaning forward a little too much. "How am I being ridiculous?! Just because I take good care of my attire doesn't make me ridiculous."

"You getting animated over a little _teeny bit_ of tea on your shirt is."

He pointed at her. "It's _not_ a shirt!"

"Okay fine, your gi. Now can you stop leaning on my countertop?" She dismissed his corrective-ness with a simple wave of her hand, but he didn't listen to her.

"I'm not doing any harm anywhere, so I can lean on this no matter h-" He had spoke too soon, because he lost his grip, and his feet hadn't been on the ground ever since they started bantering again. He made a really manly high pitched sound, and in a matter of two seconds, Zamasu's chest was against the countertop, and he slid downward rapidly until he came face-first with the ground, his legs hanging above him. Irene held her hand over her mouth, but her laugh came out as a loud raspberry, and then full blown laughter. She found it hard to regain her breath, just seeing the green Kaioshin face-plant the ground, upside down made her tear up.

"Are you- Are you okay?" She stood up and walked over to where Zamasu was quietly lying down… or head-standing or something? She couldn't tell, but it was still hilarious. Zamasu's face was against her carpet, so all he could manage was an audibly annoyed mumble. She knelt down to his side, still cracking up, and tried to help him by moving his legs sideways, just so that he could sit up. Almost instantly, he raised his arm and tried to shoo her hands away.

"Don't… don't touch me!" His first word came out as a mumble, so he had to whip his head upwards just to speak and that made Irene laugh even harder.

"You...you should see the way your head just went up, like a damn mole, bruh!" She even snorted, and the irritated Zamasu scrambled to sit back up. She looked over and was still trying to help him, even though he didn't need much help and kept telling her to not touch him. Irene couldn't see his face when he was finally upright, partly because his head was facing downwards for some reason and-

"Hold on, is that a _smile_ I see?" She tilted her forward just to see his face, and he looked the other way, suddenly defensive over her seeing his face.

"No I'm not!" That wasn't a well correlated response, but he didn't care. He was just more shocked at the fact that he actually _fell_ like an stood up seriously with his arms crossed. Irene had to admit, even though they just bickered again, she kind of missed how silly their arguments used to be and how she would laugh at them at the end of the day. But this, _this right here_ , was way too funny. It will be something that Irene will bring up randomly just to see his angry look, especially because she had caught a glimpse of him sort of _maybe_ smirking over it afterwards.

"I _told_ you not to lean too much. That's why you should _listen_ to me more often." She stood up and smiled at him, and Zamasu looked at her and then looked away.

"Shut up!" He went back upstairs all annoyed and stuff, but Irene found it to be lighthearted this time. She knew he wasn't really mad at her anymore, and even though her initial problem may not have been solved immediately, she'll find that it'll gradually be solved. Irene didn't forget her main motto for the entire year Zamasu will be here, and that's exactly what she had forgotten to do over the past month:

 _Just give it time..._

 _Like an idiot_ , Zamasu thought, he fell off of a _countertop_. What type of God falls off of raised _flat_ surfaces so easily?

He does.

Another dunce-strike goes to the fact that he didn't get another book while he was downstairs; he was so enraged that he completely forgotten to grab one, and now he'd rather stay upstairs and not have to face Irene again after what happened. At least until the night is over, maybe until tomorrow is over, or the end of the week. Or month.

He knows that she'll never live that up.

He decided to spent the next several hours doing… something? Zamasu had no form of entertainment in his own room other than reading books, he'll have to improvise the rest of his time until Irene sleeps, just so that he can get a book.

Why was he so adamant on waiting until she slept? It's not like he was some tiny little defenseless human surrounded by perpetrators, he had no reason to sit here and bore himself for the sake of Irene's presence, or lack thereof. Him falling on his face would do nothing that would hurt him. Now that he thought about it, the entire ordeal was indeed silly, and even though he would never admit it, he was _close_ to chuckling when he got up. The only reason he suppressed it was because it was unfamiliar.

It was very uncommon for him to react that way whenever he did something wrong or whenever he failed at something. If he were to do that in the presence of another Kaioshin, he would have reprimanded himself mentally for being so stupid, and said Kai would give him a confused look. Due to the amount of weight his species puts on regality, nothing says the opposite of that like arguing with a mortal woman, and then falling forwards because of it. Her reaction contrasted greatly with the renowned Kaioshin, she laughed off of him falling and it wasn't in a way to demean him at all. She simply found it funny, and wasn't caring about how ridiculous he looked. And because of that, he almost lost his formality by chuckling and laughing it off. He knew deep down that such a thing wasn't necessarily _bad_ , but Zamasu was terribly self-critical, even though he was very self-absorbed. Also, he was kind of brought up that way, living under very high expectations kind of restricts you from accepting silly failures in your life.

Especially if you've been living that way for thousands of years. It actually didn't seem like a lot of time; compared to the usual Kaioshin life expectancy, he was _really_ young. If one were to condense his vast lifetime into human years, he'd be just about a few years older than Irene and her friends.

A very tiny part of him, like a subconscious part of him, was actually okay with the fit that he and Irene had, and it had everything to do with how unserious the ordeal was, and how Irene had the ability to switch off her direct anger just because she figured that being angry with him forever would not fix anything. That same part of him did not criticize him for actually being amused at himself falling, but Zamasu didn't pay any mind to that at all. Instead, he just overthought the entire thing.

Like he almost always does.

' **='='='='='='='='='='='='='='='**

The morning has finally come, and the Kaioshin was still sitting on his bed. He didn't hear the sound of footsteps in the second floor of the room at all, so he assumed that Irene was downstairs all night. That be weird, don't humans need to sleep every single day? Why was he even questioning and considering her whereabouts? It's not like he was concerned about her, she could jump off a cliff for all he cared. He might even push her off of one, too.

Zamasu didn't actually leave his room to go and find a book, apparently time decided to speed itself up and before he knew it, the sun was up. On the bright side, he did find something to do in all night, aka tossing a little silver-colored ball that he found in his closet up in the air. Even though the sun was up, he still didn't hear Irene's voice nor did he hear her walking through the hallways, and despite his rather impeccable hearing capabilities, he didn't even hear her downstairs. _Is she outside or something?_ No, because if she was, he would have saw her walking in her backyard, since his window gave him a full view of her backyard including her garden. She may have went out somewhere, but why would someone go out during such ungodly hours of the night? That would be kind of weird.

Curiosity got the best of him, and he decided to leave the comfort of his room and go downstairs. Well, it wasn't only curiosity, he kind of wanted some tea too. He slowly went down the stairs, scanning the living room when it came to view. He was surprised to find _everything_ still and in place, it was as if no one but him lived here. Making his way to the kitchen just to heat up the kettle, Zamasu pulled out another tea cup, and ran through the assorted tea bags to find some green tea. He sat down on a stool, and waited for a good five minutes until the water started boiling. Even after the water boiled, and after he poured into the cup, he still did not hear any signs of Irene's presence. Placing the cup on the table in front of his seat, he soaked the tea bag into the hot water, swirling it around with a silver elegant spoon-

 _What the heck, the tea turned green!_ Zamasu watched as the water did not take the usual brown color that it would have; usually green tea would still be a brown color, but this one had a verdant green hue to it. _Intriguing_. He walked over to the living room and opened the front door, poking his head outside. He saw her car, which means that either she probably didn't go anywhere and was in the house hiding or something, or she went out for a walk… but that last possibility was out of whack. Humans can't spend more than six hours walking by themselves.

He looked at the one door that he had never laid his hands on, the one leading to her secret _lair_. Maybe she was in there, _despite the fact that I did not hear any door opening all night_. The door had a weird knob; it wasn't even a knob, it had a latch-like appearance and was meant to be pulled to the side, but Zamasu did not know that. So he held the golden latch, and was pulling the door but it wouldn't budge. He tried to push it, and it still wouldn't budge. _Was the door locked?_

Like any genius, he did shake the thing, and that was when he realized it was a sliding door. It opened to reveal a well-lit staircase that went downwards, and was greeted by the cool breeze of whatever room it led to. This was the entrance to the enshrouded floor that he would see if he'd taken a look at the exterior of her home. As he made his way down the stairs, Zamasu started to get a faint, odd scent that he could not pinpoint, which only got stronger with every single step. Is there something that Irene is doing that he doesn't know about?

When he finally got down to the actual room, he was taken aback. It looked _far bigger_ than it looked exteriorly, and all that he saw were random paintings, either on a canvas sitting/ hanging by or on the wall or on one of the shelves. There was a rack of canvases that were in the process of drying, and a large stash of paint and a variety of art supplies sat near and in the main cabinet of the room. _So that's where the smell was coming from_ , Zamasu fully stepped into the premise, shocked at the amount of work that was sitting beneath his feet all this time. Right in front of him was a giant painting of a meadow with a bunch of dandelion leaves flowing in the breeze while the sun gleamed happily on the grassy terrain.

He slowly approached every piece of work like it was some sort of psionic ball or something. The amount of intricacies and detailing that went into these paintings, and the atmosphere they each had was _phenomenal._ Some were abstract, and some looked like real-life photos, some looked like they were in between, but the Kaioshin would be lying if he said these works _weren't_ beautiful. There all had something in common; all represent positivity and light-heartedness; it was funny because being light-hearted and playful was exactly what Irene was like, _much to his dismay._ But the same light-hearted vibe he got looked amazing on a canvas, he wouldn't dare to touch any one of them because of how seren they looked.

"You know, I actually didn't think you'd be interested in figuring out what was in this room."

He really jumped when he heard Irene's voice. She came out of another room that he did not notice wiping her hands with a white towel. Her curly hair was in a high messy bun, and she had paint on her forehead and cheeks. "So what brings you here?"

Zamasu glanced at one of the paintings, and then at Irene. He could have just said he didn't know where she was, and curiosity got the better of him, but Zamasu knew she'd more than likely mock him for being so concerned. "I was drinking tea upstairs," he pointed to the ceiling of the room, "and then I heard a noise that came from down here and wanted to know what it was."

Irene made a cute pouty face. " _Awwww_ , I would believe that if it weren't for the fact that I didn't make any noise down here. Well, not ones that you could hear from upstairs, and I didn't think you'd be so concerned with me at all."

There was no way to rectify that answer now. So he went straight to what he did best; negating any statement she made on his person. "Us Kaioshin have excellent hearing. It shouldn't be surprising to know, if you've taken a good look at my ears."

"Either you're hearing stuff," that made his eye twitch, even though he was lying, "Or you're listening to my heartbeat right now with that kind of hearing, because I did not make any noise here for a long time, soooo…" Irene then shrugged. "Did you think I had gone somewhere?"

"No." He answered flatly, because yes he did think she went out, and yes he was wondering where she was with _no concern_ , we have went through this already.

Maybe that was the wrong response, because Irene gave him a smirk that just about spelled trouble. "So you were just worried about me? How _sweet_. I'm not gone or anything, I'm just down here organizing things."

Zamasu decided not to counteract her statement, and instead made a _Hmmph_ sound, turning away just to go back upstairs. His eyes wandered around the room as he walked out, and for some reason he caught sight of the large cans of paint out of the many others. The colors to him all had weird descriptive names of their hue, like Cadmium yellow, Titanium white and Prussian blue, and surprisingly the cans still looked aesthetically pleasing despite not being organized like the ROYGBIV spectrum. One of the cans had paint that was a light green color; it wasn't pale, but it wasn't a forest green color either. The can was labeled 'Lettuce Green'.

Zamasu's eye twitched as he exited Irene's art room.

(::)(::)(::)(::)

Realizing that she would have to park her car a bit far away from her destination, Rebecca turned her steering wheel, now driving to the near-end of the parking lot. The red haired woman wasn't alone in the car, she had Ollie sitting on the back seat, quietly preoccupied with the toy she took for him during their trip, and Loki sitting next to him staring outside the window. The pug had a white harness around his body attached to the side of the front passenger's seat, and she had a reason to do this whenever she drove to Pet's Foodtown. Pet's Foodtown is basically the supermarket for pets, it had a wide selection of food for many animals, and whenever she took Ollie out with her to this place he'd go crazy. Since he was too busy pawing at a small furry dog bone Rebecca didn't have to calm him down from jumping and happily barking coming from him, _yet_. So now she can definitely park in peace.

She stopped her car in the space that she finally found to park, undoing her seatbelt and turning to her babies in the back. "Ollie, Loki, we're at Foodtown."

At the mention of 'Foodtown', Ollie looked up from his bone and stood up to look out the window, and did exactly what he's known for doing; jumping and barking happily. He started trying to reach for the door, but his leach would not allow him to, so he was standing on his hind legs with his front legs outstretched. Then realizing he couldn't get out through the back passengers seat, he went straight to the front, onto Rebecca's lap, and eagerly headbutted Rebecca's arm, all the while barking loudly. Loki just sat in the back watching Ollie quietly, as if he was saying 'Brother, please calm down'.

Rebecca undid Ollie's leash on the front seat, and attached Loki's collar to his leash. She got out the car and was instantly dragged by both ollie and Loki towards the store. Immediately met with the light, happy colors of the supermarket once she entered, she made a right turn, criss-crossed through the medicinal, the toy, and the equipment section and the ended up in the snack section. Loki and Ollie both were practically dragging their owner around the snack section. They both stopped and stood on their hind legs at a pack of rainbow dog treats.

"Is that what you two want?" Rebecca picked up the bag and inspected it closely. "This is cinnamon flavored? Maybe I should go for gingersnap, don't they have that here?" She held both leashes around her wrist while sifting through the assortment of dog treats. There were various flavors of apple, pumpkin, berry, cranberry, a truffle mac and cheese. She held out each individual flavor for both her dogs to see, because the only flavors they were exposed to were gingersnaps, pumpkins and mac and cheese. It wouldn't hurt to try something new, wouldn't it? Putting the pumpkin flavored dog treats into the bag, she went along the aisle expecting to buy a couple snacks for Loki and Ollie.

Ten minutes later, she left the aisle with about twelve bags of different kinds of snacks, all for just two of her dogs. On the bright side, this will definitely last her for a long time.

Many people were glancing and looking at her in the store, and many people greeted her as she traveled throughout the aisles. Some of these people were either friends or family members of those affected in the accident that occurred last month who gave her a special thanks for tending to said patients, which she regarded kindly. She still remembered how horridly tired she realized she was after her day at the hospital, even surprised as to how she could've drove that night. It wasn't uncommon for people to recognize her outside of the hospital, but such a thing wouldn't reach the magnitude that it would had she held the same status as either Jay, Adrian, James, or Irene.

"Loki…" she looked at him when she noticed how the malamute stopped and sat, quietly looking off into the distance. It looked like he was just staring out the windows of Foodtown, and Ollie kept pulling in the opposite direction. "Loki, come here boy." she nudged his collar gently, and he still didn't budge. His tongue wasn't even out either. Ollie had to come over to put his paw on Loki's neck and attempt to crawl up his bag in order to make Loki look away and back at the both of them. After a short pause, he continued on with Rebecca towards the supply aisle. _That was weird_ …

Her shopping trip didn't end as fast as she planned for it to, but that's what happened when you have two dogs, one being overactive while the other is no less than a quiet soul. She bought just about what she needed; new shampoos, conditioners, food, Ollie's new harness, and some toys, including a new frisbee that both dogs were jumping happily over. It wasn't like any of her purchases made a dent into her wallet anyway. With one arm holding both leashes, she wheeled the shopping cart out of the supermarket, Ollie did not try to pull himself back into the store this time.

When she reached her car, she noticed that the other cars around hers have left before she exited the building. That wasn't the main observation, what really caught her eye was the scratch against the side of her door. It wasn't an ordinary car-door scratch, nor was it a scratch from a key, but it looked like it came from a serrated steel _knife,_ it went across her car door to the driver's seat. _How the hell did this happen?_ Who would possibly run up to her car with a knife just to vandalize her car? Irritated, she shook her head and pressed a button to open the passenger's seat door for her dogs. Undoing the chains, she ordered both of them to sit in the car while she quickly inspected the vehicle for any more damage, which there was none more. She sat down and revved up the engines, her mood dampened by the damage on her car, now she needed to make a stop to the repair center.

The roads were relatively clear, so it wasn't hard to see and pinpoint everything while she drove. Rebecca's eyes flickered back to the pair of dogs, raising her brow when she saw Loki sitting up straight, looking out the window like he was trying to find something. Ollie was also trying to figure out what Loki was looking for, if he was looking to for anything. "Loki, Ollie." she released the wheel when she reach a stop light. "You two okay back there?"

Loki's eyes went to the front of her car out of the window, and Rebecca turned just in time to catch a black van escape the corner of her eye and realized the possible reason for his weird behavior. While Loki was under the roof of his abusive owner, the man would go out and do whatever he wanted, driving his black van. She didn't remember the exact model of the car, but it looked strikingly similar. Maybe it had passed by while she was in Foodtown, is that what he was looking at? The light turned green, and she had to make a left, which means the van would pass her while she drove on the adjacent road. As soon as she approached and passed the black van, Loki started howling and pushing back against his seat.

Rebecca jumped, and Ollie even flinched a little at the sudden cry of the malamute next to him. "Loki, it's okay. It's okay, buddy." She couldn't even console him fully because her attention had to be on the road in front of her. Ollie started getting visibly worried, and he went to his owner's lap while looking at the howling dog in the backseat. Just the mere sight of anything that reminded Loki of his past-owner would set off his anxiety. She could have kept driving and repeating to him that it was okay, but she couldn't bear hearing either one of her babies cry. And now, Loki's anxious howling was making Ollie whimper.

She pulled over into a gas station and undid her seatbelt. Ollie was in her lap, looking at her as if hoping she could solve this problem. She reached over to stroke Loki comfortingly, and he instantly shot forward right next to her in the front seat, sticking really close to her arm while whining. "Loki, it's fine. The van is gone, it's not what it looked like, okay?" She stroked both heads of the distressed dogs. "Ollie, it's okay. I know you're upset because Loki's upset. It's gone."

Actually, it wasn't. Loki moved closer to his owner and kept tapping her chest as he stared out the side view window of her car. Rebecca looked to where he was only to find the _same_ black van pulling over to one of the gas pumps. Once the van came to a complete stop and its door opened, Loki when to the opposite door and started clawing it.

"Loki…" Ollie looked between the two, and went to his fellow canine to try and console him. Rebecca peeled out of the gas station as fast as she could, not even caring to look at whoever came out of the vehicle. Loki started looking around trying to see if the had 'escaped', and when he realized they did, he finally calmed down. She _was_ debating on whether or not she just return home and get her car fixed later, or if she should go and get it over with, but her biggest concern was Loki's wellbeing. Luckily, his anxiety leveled off pretty quickly compared to how he was a year ago, and Ollie was definitely a great comforter for him when she could not completely console him.

On another note, why was she seeing more black vans lately? Over the course of the last month ever since Samos got arrested, there has not been a day where she'd drive through West City and _not_ see at least one black van on the street. It wasn't as though they had launched a new model, because the vans actually looked really new and expensive. Also, every single van she's seen was _sleek_ clean, not a single lick of dirt or debris was on the exterior, that was what indicated that there was more than one van cruising around the city. They more than likely linked to Samos, Rebecca didn't think the man had that many connections (but she guessed that's what you get for becoming a convict). Looks like Loki is more than likely staying home for the time being, he's a Malamute even, warm weather doesn't really suit him that well. She looked at the two dogs in the front seat, Ollie had the toy he was playing either and he was nudging the squeezy-toy towards Loki for him to play. Gosh, they were so adorable.

She driven past K. Greinhardt and did a double take at the hospital sign that sat outside of the hospital's gate. There was...graffiti? She couldn't even consider it as artistic graffiti, it literally looked like someone just wrote something over the sign with red spray paint. Curious as to what it said, and very pissed off that someone could even do such a thing, she made a U-turn in a spot that was ahead of the hospital. Once she was finally in eyesight of the words, she slowed down and read the red-tinted words and froze in her car seat;

 **We're coming to spill Red Hair**

Is it stupid that such a corny statement actually make Rebecca really paranoid? Because she wanted to believe it was stupid to get worried, but with what the spray paint entailed, and the fact that she was the only person in that hospital with _red hair_ , she couldn't help but actively get worried, and definitely pushed a little harder on the acceleration of the hovering vehicle she was in. She definitely need to get home, she needed to head home and not be outside until the next day, because all of these weird happenings were getting to her pretty easily. It should, too. She was rather rich, and a well-known doctor for that matter, but there never been a time where she thought that someone would try to come at her in any way. Well, it wasn't like it was a threat…

 _The sign literally said they were coming for red hair, Rebecca. Use your brain._ Who are _they_ anyway?

She shouldn't worry. If she worries, then Loki would worry, and then Ollie would worry, and the whole car ride would be no less than a quiet anxiety fiesta. It took her a short amount of time to get home, quickly undoing both leashed of her dogs and getting out of the car and damn near jamming her keys into the door's lock and opening the door, scanning her house to see if anything had been misplaced, stolen or damaged. She made a quick lap throughout her house, in every room possible, and found that nothing wasn't in abnormal shape. She let out a giant sigh of relief, but _why though_? It's not like… they knew where she lived or anything. It's not like she was ever confronted by anybody, it's really not like that at all.

She plopped down against her couch and pinch the bridge of her nose. The red haired woman was definitely being paranoid. Besides, if they tried anything with her, she had more than enough backup. She had Irene, Adrian, Jay…

Of the three people she thought about, only her best friend would help her, because Irene knew how to fight, but not as well as either Adrian or Jay. The both of them nearly had superpowers, not to mention Jay had been taught martial arts since he was a child, but the two males didn't like her. What if these people were big, stocky and super muscular? Then she'd really be fucked, and all of her friends didn't even live across the street from her, so if worse come to worse, she'll have to deal with them on her own if they kick down her door and-

 _That's enough now. Stop it, stop getting paranoid_. She mentally disciplined herself to keep her thoughts at bay, taking a nice deep breath. Then her phone rung, and she nearly jumped out of her skin staring at the white flat device against her coffee table. The screen wasn't facing her, so she had to manually grab the phone and turn it over to see who was calling. This was probably the longest and most anxious ten seconds of her life, she reached slowly for her phone until she grabbed it, and then turned it over quickly. Instantly, her heart rate calmed when she saw Irene as the Caller ID. "Heyyyy girl, how ya doin'?"

A chuckle. "I'm fine, Becky- umm… have you been running?"

"No…" Irene was asking that because Rebecca was close to panting at this point. "Why do you ask?"

"Because you're short of breath?" That made sense, but Rebecca didn't want to figment worry in her friend's mind, so she wouldn't explain it.

"I was doing housework, I mean I didn't really think I was breathing that hard but uhh… yeah." She shrugged.

"Um, okay. So, look." Irene shifted in her seat in the dining room. "I'm going to travel for an entire month, starting around next week for art exhibitions."

"Okay." Rebecca was kind of dejected, because not only was she not going to see her friend physically for a long time, but that meant that she had no kind of defense on her side in case if- _THAT'S ENOUGH!_ "For an entire month?"

"Yeah, and umm… I don't think Zamasu can stay here all alone, I mean I've seen how you two talk to one another, and apparently he's been to your place before."

"Right." Rebecca nodded. "So you're asking me if he can stay with me for the time being while you're gone."

"...Kind of." Irene sounded really reluctant to say a flat-out 'yes' because she thought it would be kind of a _reach_ to just put Zamasu in another place. But Rebecca apparently was okay with the idea.

"No, no, that's perfectly fine! He can stay with me, he definitely can, I have no problem with it." … A little _too_ okay with the idea.

"Alright, alright, I just wanted to make sure- i mean you're not doing any trips next month, are you?"

"Nope. We haven't scheduled one, and if we did, we'd have notice of it almost three weeks prior to said trip, so… seriously, I'm okay with it. Ollie definitely is, I'll surprised him with his arrival." She giggled at the thought of Ollie nearly tackling Zamasu once he sees him again. That'll be cute, she found the both of them to be cute.

"Okay, I got you. Thank you so much, I'll let him know too, I'm sure he's gonna celebrate over it, that green motherfucker."

Rebecca heard a male voice on the other end of the call, and it was not the green motherfucker Irene was talking about. "Babe, that's kind of mean."

"Shhh, James." Irene held her finger to her lips. "He doesn't know, he's sitting in the living room minding his own business."

Rebecca heard another faint but male voice, this time it was Zamasu saying 'What?', followed by James' 'Nothing', and she was pretty sure Zamasu gave him a scornful look because the two males went silent after that.

Irene spoke up. "Lemme go before these two kill each other in a staring contest, alright. I'll talk to you later!"

"Bye bye!" She hung up, still not being able to contain the stupid smile on her face. Now her entire mood took a full 180, instead of being anxious and worried, she was now giddy and anticipating Ollie's new friend to stay for a month. This will be great.

Unknowing to Rebecca, nor to her two dogs who were now running around her living room, another black van drove past the large mansion, the window rolled down and one of the people in the back snapped a picture of the house. The man turned to the others' in the car.

"Are you sure this is where she lives?"

He then received a dunce to his head. "You idiot, that was her car! The exact same license plate. I know what I'm doing."

The driver of the car glanced back at his cohorts. "We keep at it for a couple of months. After we got what we need, then we could strike."

Both men in the back nodded in agreement. By the way they both obliged easily, it was obvious the driver was the leader of the group, but he was definitely not the leader of the entire pack…

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Can we all just agree that clumsy Zamasu is the best Zamasu? No? Okaaaay x3. He's gonna be relocating in the next few chapters, get ready for some dog-to-God broship, guys xD.**

 **I'm supposed to be asleep right now, but I was itching to get this chapter done and it's finally finished! I need to go before I end up with lead eyes tomorrow morning...**

 **I dunno if I can post links to videos, but here is where I got the inspiration for Ollie being super hype.** **watch?v=NZLx8FB_lyw**


	12. Fragmented

**Quick little story; One time, I was on Tumblr (no, I don't have an account there anymore) and I was looking at some art pertaining to DBS. Somehow, I stumbled upon this one headcanon from a person who roleplays as Zamasu, where it questions if he's an autistic Kaioshin…**

 **What's really shocking is that a lot of what the person said actually had a pretty big correlation to how Zamasu acts.**

 **Just saying, that headcanon got me fucked up xD.**

 **It is taking less time to upload new chapters, school is already nearly over. All I have is one more final to do and a regent and then I'm done.**

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 **Fragmented**

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"You're leaving?"

"Yup."

"For an entire month?"

Irene nodded. "I got art exhibitions to go to, so I'll be flying around the world for that long."

If Zamasu could dance, he would, but the Kaioshin was stiffer than a tree trunk. Him busting a move would probably make someone's eyes bleed. "That's good."

Irene was about to agree with him, but then she frowned. "In what way?"

Zamasu crossed his arms. "I don't have to deal with you for an entire month."

The biracial woman chuckled. "You know, I thought we had settled our differences and things like that yesterday evening, but you're still as sour as you've always been."

"You _make_ me become sour, woman." Zamasu narrowed his eyes while leaning back against the couch. "You and the entire human race."

She then skipped away to the kitchen while saying ' _Green apples are always the souressssst_ ' in a sing-song tone. The now more-than-irritated Kaioshin stood up and followed her straight in because she just disrespected his birthplace… or birth… fruit? She disrespected the way his kind was born. "I don't think making amends also gives you the privilege to insult me."

"E _y_ , back away." She raised a finger while stirring the pot of he-didn't-know-what-it-was around, mixing up the ingredients. "I'm making food for the both of us, so don't get up in my face and start trying to scare me."

The Kaioshin was instantly offended. " _Try_?" He stood behind her. "You really think that I didn't notice how frightened you were? Don't make me punch you."

Of course, Irene was having too much fun toying with her words. "Look, if you keep standing behind me like that, I'm gonna start taking that as you wanting to hump me or something."

"...Huh?"

She turned around thinking that he was glaring at her intensely, but instead was met with a really confused facial expression. "Hmm?"

Zamasu blinked. "...What does that mean?"

 _Gosh, this man is actually really innocent_. That was probably the easiest sexual joke to comprehend. "Humping basically is when your crotch," she legitimately pointed to his crotch area, he was wearing his full suit, "touches my ass. Repeatedly." And then she pointed to her ass.

"W-WHAT?!" The Kaioshin's voice cracked as his eyes widened, hiding his face and fast-walking away from behind her. "WHY WOULD YOU THINK SUCH A THING?! WHAT IS _WRONG_ WITH YOU?"

"I mean hey, you were a little too close for my comfort…" She spoke in a sultry voice. "I dunno about _yours_ , though."

He had the most appalled, disgusted, yet comical look on his face. " _Excuse me_?" He crossed his arms. "Why would I dirty myself like that?"

Irene slowly turned back to him. "...You're not having any of this for lunch." She pointed to what she was making, watching as there was a spark of surprise on his face, which was then wiped away with a shrug.

"You can't tell me what I can and cannot have." The way he whipped his head away from her and closed his eyes looked so dramatic that it made her laugh. Zamasu opened an eye in her direction. "What's so funny?"

She poured her Minestrone soup into a clean, elegant polished bowl. "I didn't think a God could be such a diva." Once again, she was met with the same confused expression, and she sighed. "A diva is someone who has a kind of… inflated view of themselves." It's really hard to explain what that means without using the word 'primadonna', and apparently Zamasu didn't seem to mind the fact that she technically just called him an egomaniac, so she explained further. "They're usually rude and belittling."

 _That_ was when Zamasu turned right back to her. " _You_ are the one who's rude. And I don't belittle those who are of importance."

She tilted her head. "But you belittle me and every single human being that you have and haven't met."

"Exactly."

"So like, what the fuck?" She raised her arms questioningly, and Zamasu tilted his head. "You're tryna say I'm not important?"

"Yes."

A simple, straight answer, but Irene wanted more than that. "So that still makes you rude if you think it's okay to belittle me."

Zamasu shook his head. "It really doesn't. If I gave you the privilege of respect, you would spoil it within a week's time."

Somehow, through her questioning, Irene found out the extent of his ego, and it was actually so big that he may as well have cognitive dissonance. If someone acts like a piece of shit, they should at least be able to acknowledge that… Right? Shouldn't gods be experts at such a mindset, since their awareness is higher than a human? Why was this something he couldn't seem to address, even though he has been alive for far longer than she has? She decided to push her inquiry a bit further. "How do you know?"

He simply shrugged. "That's what you humans do. You destroy everything that is granted to you."

"Not _everything_ , and not _every single_ human being is a douche." _Or as douche-y as you are._ "Is that what all those years of observing and being a God taught you?"

She was treading carefully with her words, because even though she could have dished off his idiocy of her species as him being stupid, it made her curious as to how he ended up developing, and _keeping_ a thought process like that. Also, she knew he hadn't mastered the trick of answering a question without really answering it, so all he'll have to do is return back to his rhetoric of 'Human and mortals are' this and 'Human and mortals ruin' that. That is how she solidly knew that his ideals were weak and based off of emotions, however she could not say this outright and directly _to_ him, because it would do nothing to make him think if he even does that. Had she dispersed all of her thoughts on him right now, it would go right over his head, so the best thing she ought to do was keep doing… what she normally does. Let him see by actions rather than words, because apparently he can't be reasoned with.

Zamasu would have gotten offended, but he didn't. He thought this was one of Irene's insults and rebuttals, but he didn't know that Irene didn't _plan_ on him being offended. "I think I could ask your species the same question; all those years of evolving and dying yet you all _still_ don't know how to keep yourselves alive."

"I'm. Not. Every. Human. Being." She kept pointing at herself after every syllable. "I can't account for everything that my species has done because I wasn't _there_. So you can't get upset at me, or at individual people, over what humans do."

You'd think that she was upset at him, but this whole time she has been chill and calm, even though he blatantly just said that she doesn't deserve respect. And Zamasu himself _was_ calm as well, he found no difficulty to answer her question because he didn't need to think hard to respond to them. Irene on the other hand, knows that he _needs_ to think more to answer her, and to question himself as well. He did what she expected her to do, he just sighed and looked in another direction with his tea in hand, mainly because he felt he didn't want to answer her obvious statement. Irene figured he just didn't have anything to say and decided to ignore her for the time being, so she switched the subject back to where it _would_ have been. "Anyways, I am leaving in about three days from now, so you got a good 72 hours to 'deal' with me." It should be the other way around, of course. Now that she knows him a _smidgen_ more than she used to, her jokes and sarcasm started to revolve around nearly mocking his hate for humans rather than just him being green and born from a magical apple tree. _But hell, that tidbit of information is funny too._

"Hmmph." He wasn't in deep thought, he wasn't thinking about what she asked him. Irene figured he'd dwell on it later, like he did when she called him grateful, because she questioned his integrity.

She looked down at the ground for a moment in feeling, and then she took her bowl of soup and served herself a hefty bowl, since Irene kind of didn't eat all that much ever since she woke up. It wasn't uncommon for her to wake up and stay for a few hours with on an empty stomach; that mostly happened when she was busy, and she has actively been packing and preparing for her long global trip along with a few other well-known artists. There'd be much to pack and a hell-lot to carry with her, but Irene wasn't the weakest woman on the planet. She may look pretty slim, but had a toned and curved build, her addition of muscular strength came from going to the gym and sparring with Adrian. She could never, in her days, spar with Jay because the man was actually _really_ strong from the martial arts training he did as a kid. The Asian male had mastered a lot of energetic control, so much so that he can do this thing that he calls a _ki blast_ , being able to charge it up and fire it with ease. Recently, as in a few years ago, Jay has taught Adrian and her to do the same, and the both of them could execute the attack now but it wasn't as controlled and powerful as Jay's was. Irene witnessed it before; while Adrian could easily blow up a few walls, Jay could probably take down her house if he aimed at the lower levels of its foundation, and her house was _pretty damn sturdy_. Irene couldn't do none of those feats, but she definitely could fight, that's for sure.

Looking behind her at the green Kaioshin who was now sitting comfortably in the dining room with his tea, she took out another bowl and poured some of her soup in that one too. For some reason, that has become a habit of hers since she's not alone in the house. It wasn't because of Zamasu, it was something that she always did when other people were in her house for more than a day. It was a mannerism she grew up with; if there is more than one person in a house, make enough food for double that amount. She took both bowls along with the appropriate silverware, placing hers across the table from him, and then his right in front of him. "Here." She placed a spoon next to the bowl.

Zamasu blinked down at the bowl and looked at Irene. He looked down at the bowl of fresh soup, the aromas made his mouth water and a big part of him wanted to eat it right the heck now. However, he resisted the temptation for _now_ , and slowly turned back to Irene. "Why do you continue to make me food for? I don't need to eat."

Irene opened her mouth to answer but then she closed. She answered straightforwardly. "I really dunno. I just know that you'd like it."

"Well, you know nearly nothing." _Nearly_ , because subconsciously what he was saying wasn't true at all.

"You like everything I make you, okay?" She smirked. "You don't need to admit it if it pains you to do so, but I know." He just narrowed is eyes and did his scowling thing at her again and she rolled her eyes while going to sit down and eat her own portion of her well-rounded cooking. "Just eat your soup and stop making things difficult."

He was going to answer her, but he decided that pointless arguing would get him nowhere. Zamasu had realized that Irene was slowly having a knack of ending every dispute that the two had by either changing the subject, or making the situation light-hearted, especially when he gave her the truth about the human race. She doesn't understand the weight of what he saw, what he observed over thousands of years-

 _How could she do so, anyway? She's a human, and humans don't understand anything, not even themselves._

He lifted his spoon, and picked up a portion of the soup and placed into his mouth and instinctively closed his eyes. By _Kami_ , this tastes far too amazing to be cooked by a mere human being, there was no way that Earth food could always taste so good. Zamasu opened his eyes again, suddenly hit with a very strong yet flavourful taste in his mouth. It felt like the soup opened up his taste buds to another dimension.

Meanwhile, Irene was eating her soup like a regular person because she was used to, and proud of, the cultured tastes of her food. She was about a quarter done with her within a short amount of time, not realizing how hungry she really was. _Damn, packing must've taken a lot out of me_ … She sighed, casually looking up and then to the right, and blinking back to the male right across from her who was eating her food with an incredulous look on his face. He looked like he was trying to pinpoint all the different tastes with every spoonful, and with every spoonful came a vibe of pure delight from the soup itself. Normally she'd smile and go back to whatever she was doing, but this particular Kaioshin did say that he didn't like her food not even ten minutes ago, so she propped her hand against her chin while staring at him accusingly.

It didn't take Zamasu long to notice, but when he did he was chewing. He blinked twice and raised an eyebrow nonchalantly, as though he wasn't just marveling at Irene's cooking a few seconds ago. "...What?"

" _Sure shit_ , you said you didn't like my cooking." She pursed her lips and tilted her head at him. Then she shook her head, and Zamasu frowned. He looked down at his bowl, and back at Irene, particularly her elbow which was resting on the table and propping up her face.

"It's not polite to put your elbows on the table." And then he went back to eating, completely disregarding and not admitting that Irene cooks exceptionally well. She laughed it off however, she already knew what was true anyway.

Matter of fact, she learned so much from him with every exchange and question she had for him to answer. It was obvious that Zamasu couldn't question his own behavior, and she doesn't really hate him for that, _Although not doing so would be less annoying, for fucks sake_. To be truthful, she would kind of miss being in her house even if she'll be gone for a little bit of time. Not afraid to admit this either, she'd even miss Zamasu a little bit, even though he does nothing but spout the same rhetoric over and over again. Mainly because it was entertaining to see him scowl and do other things like reading. She'd sit in the kitchen while he ignored her presence, and just watch as his facial expression would change as he read words on a page of paper. Or sometimes he'd make himself tea and sit on one the stools in her kitchen and while tapping the ceramic cup in front of him, he'd look off at the floor in thought. She swore he resembled a child swinging their legs and just staring off into space, the only difference is that he wasn't swinging his legs at all. It's those little quirks he has that makes her think that under all that forced regality, he could be the biggest dork on the planet, in a good way too. Especially after he fell yesterday, Irene could conclude that Zamasu had the 'ability' to be a little less humorless. He just represses it around her because she's human and stupid.

It wasn't like that when he first arrived to her house about three months ago. From day one up until about a month afterwards, she literally hadn't seen him smile at least once. Slowly, she did notice that he smirks more often even if it's because he believes what she's saying to counteract his _usual_ argument is stupid. From what Rebecca told her, Zamasu even smiled while he was playing with Ollie. She'd be lying if she said she _didn't_ want to see him loosen up, because even though Irene told him that in a jokeful way before, she didn't realize how much she grown to actually want that to happen. Jokes were not in his forte, especially when she's around, because she's human and she's stupid.

A chuckle escaped her lips.

The Kaioshin across from her raised a brow. The heck was she laughing about? She looked up at him with a weird smile on her face, which the Kaioshin assumed that she was about to start trouble once again. But instead of saying anything to him, she just returned back to eating silently which kind of confused Zamasu a little, but he reveled in the silence once more.

Zamasu was still busy with his food when Irene stood up to take her empty bowl with her, even though she had more soup than he did. Placing the bowl in the sink, she then undid her hair which was pulled up for the entire day, allowing her large curly afro mane to finally be let free. She ruffled it out a bit, smiling, and turned around to get on with the rest of her preparations only to see a pair of grey eyes looking at her. "What?"

Having observed humans and mortals for a long time, Zamasu was very familiar with the different traits of humans according to their genetics and ethnicity. However, he was so used to seeing her hair pulled up or in some sort of bun that when she finally took it down, he was a little surprised to see how _big_ it actually was. He couldn't even see her shoulders anymore, most of her upper arm was out of his sight when she had her back turned to him. It made no sense, _how the heck did she manage to hold all of that back?_ And why was he even intrigued by it, anyway? There is definitely something wrong with him; that's what he felt, but for all the wrong reasons.

He didn't answer her though, he just looked past her and at the sink. Irene decided to just let it be instead, and walked out of the kitchen to continue on with her duties. The Kaioshin was left sitting alone in the dining room, finishing the rest of his soup in _peace_. _Finally_.

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"When I told Adrian, he got upset because he had just arrived from his and Jay's tour. Hopefully they'd come by and visit if they can."

"I'm pretty sure they will, baby." James gave Irene a soft peck on the lips. "I know Rebecca more than likely would, she'd always be the first to ring your doorbell if you'd leave."

James was now sitting on one of the stools in her kitchen while Irene was making dinner for her boyfriend. Sure, they were both millionaires in their own right and could spend their money on all the food they can think of, but they both loved Irene's cooking more than some expensive and fancy restaurant. In his words, she just about had 'the hands for any five-star restaurant'. The woman smiled at the thought, reminded once more of the sweet, gentlemanly-ness of her boyfriend compared to the pissed, angry and hurtful Zamasu. What a light-hearted way to spend her night, because to be quite frank, she hadn't gotten a chance to see him in weeks. Zamasu had retreated back to his room with ten books in his arms earlier, she was pretty sure that he'd come by for more. Now that James is here, the Kaioshin would more than likely try to avoid their eyes like the plague if he came back downstairs.

"What about the guy?"

Irene looked back and blinked. "Hmm? Zamasu?"

"Yeah, him. Is he gonna stay here by himself?"

"Well no. He's going to Rebecca's house. That wouldn't be a problem for him because Ollie and Loki are there, and he likes animals." She stirred the contents in the pot much slower and gentler. "He gets along with Rebecca much better, he'll be fine."

James nodded, pondering something that's been on his mind for some time. "Umm, Irene?"

"Yes, hun'?"

"He hasn't... tried to hurt you or anything, has he?"

"No…" Irene slowed her stirring to a complete stop. This was James being protective once again, which she adored with all her heart, and she didn't understand why he'd ask her that. If Zamasu were to hurt her, she'd tell James _right damn after_ the incident occurred. "Why do you ask?"

"Well one, because I'm your boyfriend." His voice had a playful light-hearted timbre. "And also, you're much quieter nowadays. Like, when we went to Cold Stone you were all energetic and happy and now you're more quiet and reserved in a weird way."

Leave it to James to pick out her odd mannerisms with such ease. "He hasn't hurt me at all, James. Not a single finger on my person."

"Then what's going on?"

"I don't know…" At first, she didn't have an answer to his question. The more appropriate and dismissing answer would be just 'Nothing's wrong' or 'I'm fine', but between the pause, she slowly started to gather up what was making her act weird. Irene didn't even notice how much of what was bothering her actually affected her, and to be truthful, she didn't know how to be brief about it either. James sat patiently, knowing that Irene had more to say with the way her voice trailed, so he waited until the pause was usurped. "I never really thought that little things could get to me."

The hazel-eyed man raised a brow. "Huh?"

She chuckled a little. "You already know how he hates our species and all, James. At first I honestly didn't give a shit, and I still don't about all that. But sometimes I wonder if he ever thinks back to what he tells me."

This was really rare, especially with the way Irene was now. But if you spend three months with someone who's being a constant negative influence on your behalf, you'll start to see where she's trying to get at. Her boyfriend had a feeling that she was patient enough to see Zamasu through and definitely iron-clad enough to handle his 'I hate humans' bullshit, but now she was lacking at handling the latter. "Irene, you know this guy more than I do, it's just him being ignorant and an asshole. If he says the same things over and over again, then you shouldn't even entertain that at all."

"No, it's not that." She moved over from in front of the stove and leaned against the countertop, tapping her fingers against the counter. "A lot of what he's been saying has been really… personal? Well, not really personal, but it's becoming more of him _directly_ insulting me rather than aiming all his 'human-action' anger at me. Just two days ago, I yelled at him for forcing me to do things for him."

At the word 'force', James sat up and was instantly defensive. "The hell did he force you to do?"

Irene made a gesture for her boyfriend to calm down before he'd run upstairs and uppercut Zamasu without hitch. "It's not that serious, baby. It was basically me having to do more for him and him not being grateful for it or something, like cooking for his behalf. But that stopped after I yelled at him." She didn't mention that Zamasu would even _threaten_ her to do what he said before for the sake of James mental state. "What _didn't_ stop was his direct insults to me."

James took a breath, consoling his girlfriend. "You know most of what he says is full of shit already, baby."

"Yes but… he'd say very horrible things in such a vehement way- like, how he'd hope I'd die a painful death, he would be descriptive sometimes too, and how unworthy I am of respect when I asked him to start calling me by my name rather than saying 'woman' or 'cretin' or some other shit all the time. He even implied that I was dirty or filthy multiple times." It kind of sounded stupid to be upset at things like this. "I mean, I really shouldn't be complaining on this, but I've spent a pretty long time doing nothing but being insulted and holding my tongue."

James understood her, even though Irene thought she was being incoherent. Spending a long time being verbally harassed would get to you at some point. Irene was a strong person, but even she could be broken down after a while. "Why would you even hold your tongue? Serve his ass right, actually make him see what he says!"

Irene looked down at the ground. "It would do nothing if I did that, if I told him that he was being unreasonable. He didn't even care while I was yelling at him that night, he just had an apathetic look on his face. He didn't give jack _shit_ about what I said." Now she was visibly getting angry, just rethinking of that situation made her heat up rapidly.

James stood up and placed his hands on Irene's shoulders. "Okay look, the last thing you want to do, and I know you know this, is to get upset at anything he does. I only see it as him being satisfied by it since he thinks he's fucking 'winning'."

"I do, and I really am trying but…" she rubbed her boyfriend's hands. "I just wished that he'd watch what he'd say before he'd say it." She really did mean that. Her sarcastic attitude with him only covered up how much his newfound insults would get under her skin. It took some time, but such a thing definitely is happening right now. She took scope of this entire conversation, and realized it sounded like two parents talking about a troubled child; it was relatively accurate, except this child was thousands of years older than them, and should know more than to act the way he does.

 _Should_.

A little portion of her was elated that James was here, because she really couldn't call anyone else to discuss this with because most of her friends were far too busy, and she didn't want to worry them. Rebecca had called her earlier saying that her shift hadn't ended, Adrian and Jay _just_ landed in the country and are probably sleeping off the jetlag, and even though she digressed over James coming, he still came to her home and was now reaffirming what she promised herself to do. The curly haired woman smiled. "Thanks, baby. I really needed that..."

"Don't mention it, 'Rene. But…" James came closer to her, his voice suddenly becoming voluptuous, "I think you need more than that."

"Really?" Their noses touched, and they engaged in a small eskimo kiss. "Show me." She gave him a chaste kiss, which then evolved into a full blown one. His hands slid down her shoulders and went to her curved hips as hers clasped around his neck. Fingers now enraptured in his hair, Irene made tiny noises as James' lips continued their venture on her lips-

"Oh shit, wait!" Irene broke the kiss before exclaiming, looking over to the stove and turning the dial until it was off. "If we went on for any longer, I would've burnt it… and possibly the whole kitchen, too."

James chuckled. "I got you." With strong arms, he gripped Irene's hips and allowed her to sit against the countertop. "Shall we continue?"

"With pleasure." She wrapped her arms around his neck once more, and they fell right into their make out session, allowing both their lips to part and make way for their tongues to explore each other's mouth. James made a sound of satisfaction, due to Irene's lipstick having a cherry taste, and she wasted no moment deepening the kiss even further. Her toned legs wrapped around James' waist while the both of them leaned back in the heat of their kisses.

Her boyfriend's hands were practically roaming all over her now, and her thin silk romper made it much harder for her body to resist his finger slightly brushing against her breasts every now and then. It wasn't like he was grabbing her there either, he'd just ghost his fingers around her nipple making her shudder underneath his grasp. Well, the only plus to this was that the romper itself was a deep red color so it would be a bit difficult to spot her nipples… unless if you're James. She pulled down the ribbon that was keeping the deep v-neck collar together; it wasn't completely exposing her to him, but it left a very sultry appearance to her chest and small cleavage. They broke apart with their noses touching, staring into one another's eyes and breathing heavily, James looked down to find the top of Irene's romper loosely opened, if he moved his hands into it in either direction he'd get a full view of one of Irene's breasts. Her hand went down his chest slowly, brown eyes staring deep into hazel as she undid the buttons to his button-up shirt, and he moved his hand into her romper, caressing the soft skin that was her waist. She moaned softly, this was the closest she had to bliss, there was literally nothing that could stop their _slow_ endeavours.

The two human beings may or may not have completely forgotten that the person Irene was talking about was walking downstairs as they resumed to kiss each other passionately. His steps were soft, almost inaudible, and when the Kaioshin reached the last stair, he turned to go towards the bookshelf and his eyes caught the sight of the intimate, semi-carnal scene in the kitchen. Zamasu tilted his head, obviously straight-faced but decided to let the two embark on whatever journey they wished to take, and made his way towards the bookshelf. Living for a pretty long time, Zamasu has observed humans fornicate many times and knows just how humans reproduce; the last thing he wanted was to see Irene end up having to _reproduce_ , _the foul-mouthed woman_. That was the first conclusion he came to, the second one was more obvious; humans and their lustful urges. If it weren't for the purpose of reproduction, which he figured it wasn't, it was just pure lust. The gods themselves had no need for sex, for their libidos were so low that such an act wouldn't even be needed, but that doesn't completely exclude them from having it. The only difference is that with every single case, it'd always be a conscious decision rather than just a feeling, of some sort.

The Kaioshin himself couldn't directly attest to such traits, he's never had a moment where he'd actually wanted to fornicate with anyone mostly because he was so focused on becoming a greater version of himself, an actual Supreme Kai. And also because the green Kaioshin wasn't… familiar with intimacy; even on a platonic level he didn't understand the motive behind friendships or close kinship. Hence why throughout most of his life he spent his time honing his excellent fighting abilities and observing a wretched species that should be eradicated from all recursive existence since he was young.

Well, Zamasu was still young but… he's been mentored since he was _younger_.

He never really considered anyone he knew as close, even Gowasu for that matter. Although he was Zamasu's teacher, the Kaioshin could only see him as a teacher and nothing more, someone who gives him what he needs to learn and doesn't entertain anything out of him. He couldn't see Gowasu as a father figure or someone who cared about him in any way other than him having to be the next possible Supreme Kai. Referring to Gowasu in that nature would be strange for him. Referring to anyone as a friend would also be strange because Zamasu couldn't think of a reason as to why he would do so, and as to why another would consider him one. If he sat in his room and picked up the sounds of Irene's friends laughing and chatting with one another, he would have knew that such a thing comes with understanding another being.

And the author also thinks that he could apply that same knowledge to his mindset of humanity.

Gowasu didn't understand him, not in the slightest. Who could sit down and watch a bunch of creations kill one another with a straight face? He could barely witness a war without having to look away or feel a huge pit form in his stomach. Not only did mortals make him angry, there were times where he couldn't bear to see them anymore, instances where he'd have to pretend that he was making more tea for his mentor just so that he could be far away from what he witnessed. He'd mourn and cry over the repeating failures of their civilizations, and would have to face those events over and over and _over_ again. No one, not even Gowasu, has ever seen him cry over such a thing, and nobody knows about the horrible thoughts that bubble up in his psyche everyday.

Everybody except for Irene.

She's the only person who has witnessed a smidgen of how all of this pent up anger, sorrow, rage, disdain and disappointment was slowly chipping away at his judgement. He constantly tells her to leave him alone, and it's as if the woman was hard of hearing or just… _stupid_ , because she'd keep coming back, no matter what. Zamasu couldn't make it any more obvious that he hated her with a burning _seeping_ passion, and the only reason he hadn't skinned her alive already was because of the possibly dreadful consequences that would come along with the deed. He hated the way she acted, and the way she behaved, and despised the way she talked, how she could speak so casually to someone who could, _should_ , kill her with ease, and how she just uses such foul language in his presence, and how she continuously refers to him as things that he didn't know of, for crying out loud. She's a horrible being, how could she possibly have such amicable relations with other people? And what kind of _**fool**_ would end up wanting to put their lips on hers?

Steadying his nerves, he returned and picked out new books for his reading enjoyment. He was turning to walk back upstairs just in time for both individuals in the kitchen to break apart and make eye contact with him. Irene had a weird expression on her face that mixed between confusion and shock.

"Hey, Zamasu." She spoke quietly, as if he was some child who just woke up from a nap. Her hands went towards her romper which was exposing a bit _too much_ of cleavage to both of the males in front of her, tugging it together. "Umm…" she removed James' hands from her body while her boyfriend continued to stare at Zamasu. "Dinner… should be ready in ten minutes."

The Kaioshin noticed how peculiar the change in James' expression gradually became; first being a little surprised, to annoyance, and now he looked semi-pissed. But Zamasu blinked his direction back to Irene. "You don't need to tell me."

He was expecting Irene to respond, but instead he got one from James who turned back to his girlfriend. "Yeah, baby you don't need to tell _him_." His voice had deep-rooted anger laced into it. If Zamasu were a human being, he would have been noticeably scared of James' physical build and his height since the man was a few inches taller than him. Once again, he became defensive and territorial over Irene, only more intensively this time. "Why are you here?"

James' voice held so much hostility that Zamasu wondered if the man was daring his chance of seeing the sun tomorrow. But Zamasu apathetically and nonchalantly answered, as if James' anger was supposed to be downplayed. "I came here to get books."

He had no reason to lie, and James had almost completely forgot what Zamasu even sounded like because he hadn't seen him in a long time. He was half convinced that his voice was deeper, well it was still deep, but James thought he'd sound more… menacing. He placed his hand against the counter, next to Irene's waist. "Irene told me what you've been doing to her…"

At the mentioning of her conversation, Irene sat straighter and looked at her boyfriend. "James-"

"No no, _let me finish_ , Irene." He held his finger up at her and then pointed it at Zamasu. "Do you not realized how fucked up your behavior is? You really think that barking at a woman is gonna help you with your human-hating _problems_?"

This man… referred to him as a dog. Zamasu's eye twitched; what the hell did he mean by 'problem'? Did he not realized that humans were the main problem here and not hi- _He_ is _human, Zamasu. He won't understand the judgement of such despicable nature_. "First of all," he raised a finger, voice still level but slowly getting assertive. "Don't you ever, _ever_ , associate me, a practical _God_ , with the likes of a dog. And I don't think what I have said to your woman over there," he gestured in a way that was so dismissive and disrespectful that Irene was visibly insulted. He wasn't looking at her though, "has anything to do with you."

James fully turned towards Zamasu, now actively heated from the blatant disrespect that the prominent Kaioshin was showing. "You can't expect to be respected when you refer to others like _that_ , you dipshit." He took a step forward. "Answer my fucking question; do you think insulting her is gonna help your ass?"

"James-"

"How could I possibly respect her when she doesn't know how to hold her tongue around me? She's made a mockery of my kind, and is no doubt making a mockery of hers in the process. Don't act as if she's innocent and _pristine_." Disgust was eminent in his voice, especially at the end of his statement. He practically spat out the word in relation to her like acid.

"Really? How the fuck has she done that, huh? Tell me, what did she say that hurt your fucking feelings that much, that you have to 'stoop down to our level?'" James did his thing where he puffed out his chest as though he were about fight, and Irene saw this, immediately trying to calm her boyfriend down and hopefully remind him of what he told her before Zamasu came downstairs.

"James, that's enough now, seriously." She slightly shook his shoulder and he looked at her. "Didn't you tell me not to get angry, and look at what you're doing right now. This won't solve anything."

"I just wanna get to the bottom of things, and settle shit right now. You know his retarded ass is having a effect on you, 'Rene. I'm not letting this slide." Zamasu chuckled at the exchange, and James turned back to him. "So, what is it then? What has she said? I don't wanna hear your hateful crap this time, give me a straight ass answer."

Zamasu looked between the two so casually that it only made James angrier, and Irene more apt to stop the two from arguing. He didn't speak, he just tilted his head at the other male in the room who, in his eyes, was trying to assert his dominance. Even if James was questioning him at the moment, his poised posture and angry look made it obvious that the man was trying to tote his own dominance to the Kaioshin which is unacceptable at best. But it was funny to witness, because Zamasu knew that he could crush this man within seconds.

James shrugged his arms angrily. "Oh… so now you can't figure out what to say anymore, huh?" He walked towards Zamasu, looking back and keeping Irene from grabbing his arm, approaching until he was two feet away from the Shin. "You can't pull any answers out of your ass anymore, _dickhead_?"

Zamasu raised an eyebrow. "It wouldn't make sense to you at all. You don't have the capability of realizing her mistakes nor are you able to realize your own, since you're standing so close to me." Zamasu walked over to the countertop in front of the kitchen to put his books down. He turned around and slowly walked over to where James was with a knowing smile on his face. "Is this an attempt at trying to scare me? You think your measly human body can possibly phase me?"

This is where James made a mistake, and Irene knew this, because his next request was actually going to be served. " _You think your small ass body could do anything to me, you piece of shit?"_ James was actually getting upset at Zamasu's claim, especially because the man took pride in being muscular and physically strong. The basketball player decided to punch the Kaioshin with one strong fist, but Zamasu took hold of it before it made contact with his face. With his other hand, he slammed his palm against James' chest making him fly backwards, and breaking the glass door that lead to the backyard. Ignoring Irene's gasp and her plea for _him_ to stop, Zamasu dusted off his hands, and zoomed forward to meet the man on the floor, about forty feet away from the actual, now broken, entrance. Zamasu took James and lifted him up by the collar of his shirt. "Don't ever put your hands on a God, puny mortal."

Irene ran to see where Zamasu was, and he was holding her boyfriend up. _Shit_ , she frantically looked around the area, _how the fuck am I supposed to stop this_? There was literally only one way that she could grab both of their attention, she looked down at her hands and circled them around each other, hoping her tactic would work.

James grabbed hold of Zamasu's hand and attempted to writhe free of it, but it came to no avail. With a swift swing of his left leg, he raised it up to knee Zamasu on the cheek, which actually make the Kaioshin slightly loosen his grip on James' collar. This was his chance; James then punched the Kaioshin straight in the face, finally making him lose his grip. The thing is, Zamasu didn't look like he was hurt, nor did he fall back from the impact of the punch; he only was taken a step back, and James started approaching him again.

Without warning, the space in between the both of them exploded into yellow light. James was thrown back several feet, and Zamasu, out of reflex, started flying upwards and away from the area. _Was that… was that a ki blast_? He looked over at the backyard door to see Irene with a post-concentrated look on her face, both hands outstretched slightly panting. Irene, not wearing any shoes and more than likely having stepped on a few shards of glass, staring to saunter towards her boyfriend, who was shocked shitless at what he just witnessed. There was a small crater in the space previously between the two males; it was about a foot in radius and less than a yard deep. The ki blast wasn't even that strong, but it'd be a lie if he said that such a thing didn't catch him off guard, especially because of how _precise_ the shot was. Most blasts usually create bigger-radial craters but this one behaved in the same fashion as a bullet would, and it was rather bright in essence.

Irene put both her hands on her lips, suddenly angrier than the last time he last time she yelled at him. "The both of you, stop fighting!" She then turned to the Kaioshin, who was slowly approaching the ground once more. "Do you not see what you've done to my damn door?! You know you're much stronger than James, why would you punch him and break my property?!" He looked at her, up and down, and Irene turned to James just as pissed off as she was at him. "Didn't you say not to get angry at him over the shit he says earlier, and now you're trying to throw hands with him, you idiot!? You could have gotten killed!" She started to dust off James' clothing rather harshly, even making her boyfriend wince a little.

"He should have been killed, for running his mouth." Zamasu chimed in on his own behalf because what he said was definitely right, and Irene whipped her head at him. At this moment, he didn't mentally block out how angry she was, and right now she was _fuming_.

"I don't wanna hear _shit else_ from you!" She pointed at him and Zamasu actually cocked his neck back, her caramel face slowly reddening from the amount of anger and energy that she just expelled. "I know he shouldn't have put hands on you, before you even try to justify you breaking my door down, but you shouldn't have to go to such extremes. Now look at what you've done!" She swung her arm towards her kitchen entrance. Zamasu tilted his head to look at it, and then looked back at her.

"Next time, tell your mate not to put his hands on me…"

He was about to say more, until he noticed that Irene was _shaking_. Not because she was cold, even though she wore literally nothing but a silk thin romper, but because she was so angry at his nonchalance. All of the happy, light-hearted arousal she felt earlier was thrown out the window, and replaced with full blown anger. It slowly started to grow into painful frustration, mainly because she couldn't hit him and also because he just didn't give a shit, once again, about her feelings. Zamasu noticed all of this, and frowned when she took a deep, shaky breath and abruptly turned to walk away.

James looked at his girlfriend with high concern. "Baby-"

" _No._ " She stopped in her tracks, and redialed her tone against James. She was so angry that she couldn't even look at the both of them. "Listen, just… Go back inside." James was visibly showing a tinge of worry along with fear at the way Irene took a deep breath after speaking. "I'll clean up the floor, you can just serve yourself while I'm at it." She went back into the house, this time stepping over the shards of glass instead of walking over them, and then she turned around to gesture the males to return back into the house. Zamasu looked at the ground and approached the kitchen, both hands clasped behind his back, and not making eye contact with the other male who obviously was giving him a death glare. Once the both of them were inside, Irene stopped tapping her fingers against her kitchen countertop.

James looked at the floor, still annoyed at how their night was ruined. Even though he kind of needed to use the bathroom at the moment, he felt bad for what had transpired, and wanted to try his best to make up for it. "Irene," he slowly looked at his girlfriend. "I could help you with this, hun."

"It's fine, I can clean this alone." Her voice was completely void of alacrity. "It won't take long."

"Uhh… okay." He approached his girl to give her a small reassuring peck on her forehead. Apologetically, he caressed her shoulder. "I gotta use the bathroom. I'll be back." He only received a nod, and turned around to go upstairs all the while grimacing at Zamasu. The Kaioshin just stood in the living room quietly, he didn't feel the need to return the gaze back, all he did was avert his gaze towards the disgruntled woman.

Opening a long cabinet in her kitchen, Irene pulled out a broom and a dustpan and went back to the area where the glass shards were and started sweeping up the broken pieces all by herself. The entire premise was silent, Zamasu clearly could hear the sounds of the shards sliding across the tiled floor and the shuffling of her silk romper and feet. Speaking of which, he noticed that Irene started to wince and was trying to hurry up with the sweeping, but she didn't completely stop her activity.

"..." Zamasu raised a finger, making an audible sound. "Your feet… they are bleeding."

She stopped. "I know." It wasn't that bad, the places where she stepped made tiny blood spots on the kitchen tiles. Lifting a foot up, she looked down at the sole to pull out any shards that stabbed her foot when she angrily stomped outside earlier and repeated the same process to her other foot. Hopefully, she pulled them all out, and there weren't really tiny damn near microscopic pieces that could injure her horribly, especially because she still had more to pack for her exhibition- she even forgot about that! How am I supposed to travel around the world with glass in my feet? Now that she thought about it, the pain was gradually getting worse, so she closed off her thoughts and focused solely on finished her sweeping.

All the pieces were gathered, and she went to dispose of them quietly. The Kaioshin was still standing, observing her as Irene did so, and she stood near the counter with her wrist propped against the butt end of the broom while staring down at the floor. Lips pursed, her toes moved and curled, perhaps serving as a distraction from the fact that her feet were still bleeding. The Kaioshin looked up and down at her, particularly at her feet, and wondered just how long she was going to stand there instead of bandaging her wo-

"Why are you still here?"

Irene's voice was calm and quiet. Zamasu made eye contact, and if he were some regular person he would have immediately felt a huge amount of guilt from her purely frustrated gaze. He didn't speak, because it didn't seem reasonable to do so; and also because he didn't care to answer her at all since he himself didn't know why he was watching her clean up all that mess. She continued to stare at him, and Zamasu caught the slight shaking of her bottom lip before she looked away and when to get two plates for her and James. Without another breath to waste, Zamasu took his nearly forgotten books from the front counter, and turned around quietly making his way back upstairs. Once he reached his room, he opened and closed his door, sat down on his bed and got super comfortable and took a random book from his new findings into his hands. He opened it up to the first page ahead of the index in pure silence.

 **·□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□·**

Eleven hours. Sixty hundred and sixty minutes. Thirty nine thousand and six hundred seconds. Nearly half an entire day's amount, to watch the sunrise through the break of dawn.

And in all this time, with all the books that sat on his nightstand, he still couldn't read not even one chapter of whatever what in his hands.

Okay, he did read like one book since last night, about halfway through a page until he became distracted and found that he couldn't read it any further. Because if he did read it, he wouldn't be reading the actual words on the book, and he'd flip the page not knowing what went on in the previous page, and then he'd have to go back to the last page he read in order to reread it.

Don't you hate when that happens? Zamasu definitely did.

It was late in the morning, around 10 AM, when he decided to stand up from his bed, leaving the unread books on his nightstand and going back downstairs. The first thing he was greeted to, aside from the actual living room, was Irene sitting on the couch looking downwards at something. For some odd and unknown-to-him reason, he slowly went down the stairs and strangely approached the side of the couch to look at what she was looking at, which happened to be her foot. She was noticeably in more pain than yesterday, though she couldn't seem to pull out whatever tiny shards were stuck in the soles and heels of her feet. He took a side step closer, and sat down right next to her.

Irene didn't even notice his presence until he sat down. She only glanced up at him and back to her feet, not really caring about the slight bags under her eyes or how unruly she looked at the moment. To be truthful, the woman didn't sleep well at all yesterday due to the pain in her feet, and she couldn't finish up her preparations for the next two days. Just, just how was she supposed to be well set, knowing she's gotta walk more than a few dozen feet over the course of a month? Sure, she can always seek medical help if she ended up getting infected by something, but what i-

Irene jumped when she felt the Kaioshin grab one of her ankles, pulling her left foot onto his lap. As a Supreme Kai apprentice, Zamasu was developing exceptional telekinetic abilities, so moving small things with his mind was lightwork for him. With one hand parallel to Irene's foot, he extracted all the remaining tiny shards and placed them on his other hand, which both amazed Irene at how the heck he was doing that, and at how many shards actually went _in_ her feet, and made her slightly wince. The entire process took less than ten seconds, and he did it without a word. He repeated the same process on her right foot, not even speaking or looking at Irene's chocolate brown eyes. After he had finished, he moved her foot from his lap and stood up to throw the shard pieces away.

She sat there staring at him in awe even as he filled up the kettle with water and placed it on the stove, his back turned to her. Irene looked down at her feet; miraculously, all the of pain that she was feeling was completely gone. She slowly placed one foot on the ground and then the other and stood up, nearly gasping when she realized that she didn't have to wince when she stood up. Approaching the kitchen, Irene went to her fridge to get a protein bar; she'll be too busy to fix up a meal later on so she'll have to go with whatever was in her fridge that didn't need to be heated. The snack bar was opened, and she took a small bite out of it, still leaning against her fridge and occasionally glancing at the Kaioshin who was patiently looking at the kettle. She took a breath, stepping forward and opening a cabinet that contained a box of graham crackers, cereals, various teas, and other things. She took the box of crackers, and noticed that Zamasu didn't pull out any kind of tea yet, so Irene took the small jar filled with herbal tea leaves and placed it on the counter, then slowly slid it towards him. Only his eyes moved to where it was and nothing more.

She closed the cabinet door, and looked at the screen door that she had installed as a temporary kitchen door overnight. It was a quick temporary fix, she wasn't going to resort to using a sheet in order to cover it up and all she had to do was lock the screen door in place. James ordered up the same glass door yesterday night even though she could have bought it herself, the men will be coming in to fix that up either today night or tomorrow morning, which was perfect because she wasn't planning on having her door fixed while she was on a plane. Her eyes went to Zamasu, who now moved from his place in front of the stove to sitting on a stool and resting his forearms against the counter table. She could have been pissed off still, she could have yelled at him once more this morning, but Irene didn't want to. He basically saved her from risking an infection in both her feet, so she took that as his way of apologizing, _maybe_. "Thanks."

Zamasu slowly turned to her, he didn't look upset or anything, nor did he scowl at her like he usually would. He was just neutral, looking back down at the counter wordlessly. Irene puffed out her cheeks, and took a small plate to put several graham crackers in. She took it in both hands, and turned to leave the kitchen.

"Why?"

She stopped mid-stride and turned around when she heard him speak. This was the second time in the past two days that he asked her that, and whenever he did it would always be something that she had done to him, like the last time he questioned why she made him food. And now he was questioning why she was thanking him. "Hmm?"

He wasn't facing her. "Are you not mad?"

"...Not really." Her head tilted. "I know I can always buy another and it wouldn't help if I were still yelling at you. I have to travel in less than two days so…" She scratched the back of her head and shrugged. "I don't wanna be stressed before I leave."

The kettle started to whistle, and Zamasu stood up to go and pour the boiled water into his cup, placing the herbs into a tea strainer and letting it absorb into the water. The browned color of tea swirled with clearance. He sat back down in the same spot and tapped his fingers against the ceramic cup, a part of him still pondering. It seemed like after every time she got really upset with him, Irene would go about her day and continue to treat him normally. Unfamiliar questions started to surface, though he didn't utter any of them out to her. She frowned at the strangeness of this whole semi-conversation if it could even be called that; she would have expected him to take her thanks without a word since his powers are apparently so profound, and because his ego is retardedly huge, but instead he was _inquiring_ , after doing something as tedious as pulling shards out of someone's foot. "Why are you confused?"

Zamasu's eyes went in the direction of where she was standing, but he didn't turn to face her. "I'm not confused."

She smiled, and answered her question for him. "Did you feel bad for what you did?"

At that moment, he looked back at her with narrowed eyes and scoffed. "No," he shook his head, "I didn't do that because of guilt."

" _Really_?" She crossed her arms.

He turned back around. "I did that so that you wouldn't have to postpone your trip just to stay here longer…" A pause. "...In order to annoy me."

Her smile grew, and she laughed warmly. " _Ooookay_ then, I got you." She left the kitchen and went upstairs, walking past and stopping by Zamasu's room. His door was opened, so she could step in, and see the stack of books he collected from yesterday. His uniform-armor thingy as Irene would call it was sitting neatly on the bed, and she picked it up and felt the material of the clothing. Compared to her room, his was _painfully_ empty, _I'm gonna tell Rebecca to buy this man some clothes or something_. Irene placed the suit back on his bed, and went back into her room to start packing the clothes she'll need for her art exhibition.

 **·◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊·**

"Alright. We're here."

James stopped in front of Rebecca's mansion, the red haired woman sat silently with her arms crossed and when he said that, she sat up and looked at the window, hastily getting her things together. James looked at her with a raised brow. "Umm… not even a thank you?"

Rebecca got her things together and looked at James, and unexplainable feeling of self-pity came over her person as he just smiled at her. And it made her feel even worse, so she undid her seatbelt quickly. "You don't need one."

"You're still upset, aren't you?"

She didn't answer.

"Why are you still doing this?"

"Don't you act innocent towards me, you know the answer to that question." He was reaching out with a consoling hand and she slapped it away.

James looked at the back of his slapped hand. "I haven't done anything to you."

" _Yes, you have_." Green eyes angrily stabbed the face of James, who flinched but she knew he wasn't scared of her. "You wanted me to go somewhere with you and it ended up being Adrian's place. You've driven me there, talked and chatted with your homeboys, and then drove me back home. That is all you needed to do. There is nothing else to speak of." Rebecca then shifted her body towards the car door and once her hand grabbed the jet black handle, all of the doors in the car were locked. She shook the handle a few more times, and looked back at James who had his fingers resting against his temple.

"Rebecca, explain something to me." He turned in his seat so that he would face her completely. "Why didn't you say no, and decided to come along with me knowing that Adrian and Jay more than likely do not like you?"

He used _more than likely_ knowing that Adrian wouldn't say word to her at all, but he continued. "You didn't even try to approach to the both of them. I took you along just to finally try to 'bridge' things between you guys, and this is how you repay me?"

That wasn't his motive. Rebecca knew that wasn't his motive at all. "You _know_ you don't give a rat's ass about the relations between me and them. You didn't bring me there just to _make peace_."

"Then what did I bring you there for?"

The pit in her stomach grew even more. "You did it to humiliate me."

James frowned. "Did I? How? I didn't say anything that would insult you in any way, me and the guys just talked about random shit."

"First of all…" she raised a finger in his face, "It's three guys that are taller than me at Adrian's place, that is not the issue. The issue is that you have told Adrian things about… what you've done right in front of me, and now the both of them can't look me in the eye-"

"You mean what we've done?" She stopped speaking and looked down at the floor of the car, biting her lip while her fists faltered. "I happen to be Adrian's best friend, remember that. Even though it's been less than a year since, it's not like I'm gonna _not_ tell him that you've fucked me just to make him mad. He knew about it a long time ago, even as we were still fucking."

Her eye twitched. She swallowed, due to her stomach feeling like an abyss right now. "James-"

"And it wasn't even once. You've done this multiple times, to many of his friends over the years, and tried to sweeten up your acts with the use of money and fake smiles, the only person you hadn't touched was Jay. And don't get me started on what you conspired with Jay's ex-girlfriend-"

"DON'T…" she lowered her voice, "Bring _her_ or any of that up. I don't want to hear any of it."

"Well, you thought I was trying to humiliate you today, so I had to clarify it. I wasn't trying to make you feel like a whore."

He spoke as though this was some casual conversation while Rebecca was internally breaking from his choice of words. "I'm not stupid. What other motive did you have other than to ostracize me?"

"Well, I was _trying_ to get you guys to fucking _talk_ , dumbass." He was started to get annoyed.

"How am I supposed to do that when I am sitting with two guys that I have had sex with, knowing that you gave Adrian and Jay deets on what I did to make him mad in my presence. Do you know how horrible I felt after you said that to them? They both looked me with so much fucking pity…" She was accessing memory, having to stop speaking because of how humiliated she felt, and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"It was better to have them know, just so that you see how horrible your own actions were. You guys haven't dated since high school, I don't understand why you'd even be that petty."

"The three of you don't know what happened after we broke up!"

"Well… then what happened?"

"I'm not going to tell you. It's… personal." She swallowed again, knowing it would lead her to no avail. She switched it back onto him. "If you knew that it was horrible, why didn't you resist? Don't you think that's horrid to do to your best friend?"

"The both of us weren't losing if I continued to fuck you, anyway. Besides," he shrugged, "the best things always come for free."

Rebecca's mouth parted and then she looked away from him, eyes starting to water. She swallowed again to stop any of the tears from coming out. Her voice came out shakily. "Unlock the door, James."

"Hmm." He didn't resist her request, he just unlocked it and reached over to open it for her. She looked down at his hand, and then stood up from his car and slammed the door closed. James watched as she hastily walked and unlocked her door, entered her house. He sighed and shook his head, revving up the engine once again and taking off without looking back at her front lawn.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **This is a considerably long chapter, and we're now two days in before Irene leaves. You all are slowly starting to see the dynamic between Zamasu and James, and more reasons as to why Jay and Adrian dislike Rebecca. This story has** _ **just. Fucking. Started**_ **.**


	13. Loosened Up

**Prepare yourselves for this one, because Zamasu is about to effortlessly pull in hoes…** _ **on accident**_ **.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Loosened Up**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

The next day had passed by pretty quickly; the guys who were supposed to fix Irene's door came by during the evening the day after Zamasu gracefully broke the door down. The three men walked in and stopped when they saw a pale green, white-haired, grey-eyed male sitting on Irene's sofa with a cup of green tea in one hand and a book in the other.

" _Uhh… Good evening, Miss Viberly." One of the members slowly turned their head to Irene with their eyes still staring at Zamasu._

The Kaioshin didn't say anything, but he could recall the look on Irene's face. It was borderline humor, and reassurance.

" _He's just a roommate. Don't mind him." She placed her arm out in his direction. "Do you need me to move anything in the kitchen?"_

 _They took a glance at the kitchen. "Not at all, ma'am. It's an open space already, so we could just install the door without any extra labor."_

It took about an hour or so to finish the job yesterday.Now, Zamasu was sitting alone in her house, since Irene went out for something. She told him that some more people were coming over to pick up the artwork that she left out in the living room, all of the pieces were either half Zamasu's size, or even taller than him. The woman has been gone for a few hours since this afternoon, and Zamasu took this time to read more books and sip more tea, eyes occasionally glancing at her door room and a tiny bit of curiosity piquing at his thoughts. He passed by her room at least five times, and the sixth was where he decided to actually approach the door. He was surprised to find that it wasn't locked, but then again this was her bedroom, why would you lock your own bedroom?

Turning the knob and slowly pushing the door open, his nose was greeted with the pleasant, light scent of vanilla, originating from a perfume that she used before leaving the house but he didn't know that. The scent wasn't too powerful, it was just about enough to make him inhale deeply in satisfaction. He took a step in,and finally caught sight of the room. The wall was actually a pretty beige color and the accents were mostly a rich mahogany brown. Her elegant bed frame was a deep mahogany color, and her nightstand had a holographic clock that had the time look like it was floating in mid-air. The carpet was soft to the touch, from what he could see, and there was a luggage bag on the far right of the room. He could have said that the room looked very aesthetic…

 _But there is so much mess scattered around the entire premise._

It wasn't like clutter from any kind of garbage that she may or may not have, but it was mostly clothing and shoes just laying in random places of her room, which greatly annoyed him. Zamasu was always a neat person, not necessarily a neat freak, but he didn't like seeing mess in places they were not supposed to be. So he sighed, and took it upon himself to fold every piece of clothing and placed them accordingly on top of one another on her bed, and since he was a Kaioshin, the process took less than a minute because all he had to do was telekinetically pick up all the clothing from the floor. After he had finishing folding all of the clothes, he placed the stacks on the foot of her bed, lined up with one another. If he were human, one would consider this action a bit OCD-ish, but it wasn't; for Zamasu it was all about aesthetic, it didn't fit the look of the room if he left them on the side of her bed rather than the foot. That would make it look weird.

Then, he decided to pick up the shoes and place them neatly against this small shelf that looked like it could be used for organizing shoes. Finally, taking a grand look at the now cleaned room, he smiled, pleased with his easy work and taking great pride in how neat and orderly he was. And then he realized that he had just spent three minutes of his long life cleaning Irene's room.

Irene's room, of all possible places in the entire world. And he was _smiling_ about it.

 _No_ , he shook his head, he did because he hated to see things not in order and decided to clean up _for the sake of being neat_ , his actions had nothing to do with Irene. He didn't do this to shave off the amount of work she was doing, knowing that she'd come back home exhausted and would have to rest her recently, magically healed feet and wouldn't have enough time to sort out her room. No, that wasn't the reason, none of that even mattered to him. Why was he even questioning his motives in the first place? If his brain hadn't tripped upon the fact that he organized the room of a woman that he _hated so much_ , he would have happily left the room and read his books. But now he was still standing in her room, technically arguing with himself over why he cleaned her room, knowing that it was in his nature to be an organized young man.

The doorbell rang, which cut off all his train of thought, and he exited Irene's room and closed the door, silently hoping that the person who rung the bell was not who he thought it was, and he refused to say her name. He reached the living room in a short amount of time, and turned the knob to the front door and pulled.

"We're here to pi-" The tall male standing in front of the other two behind him stopped speaking when they saw that the person who opened the door was indeed not Irene.

Zamasu blinked. "Her artwork, correct?"

They were still kind of in shock, but the leader of the three answered. "Yes. May we... step in?"

Zamasu stepped to the side, allowing the three males to enter her house. He pointed towards the artworks that leaned against the living room wall, and they nodded. The two men took the largest one while the other went for two pieces that were up to his lower torso. They came back and repeated the process with the rest, one of them coming up to Zamasu once they finished their job.

He chose careful words to not be offensive, because the man thought that Zamasu was an alien. "So are you like… her bodyguard, of some sort?"

 _Real funny_ , like he'd want to waste his time protecting a feeble woman. _Pfft._ "Not really." And he didn't make room for any more conversation. They were supposed to come in here, get all the art portraits and leave, nothing in between their duty had anything to do with socializing with a green mohawked man who just finished organizing a _stupid woman's_ room. As they left, they told him to 'have a nice day' and Zamasu internally digressed with the message; he could have a nice day when he's back home in the Kaishin realm.

Well technically, the heat had dissipated this month, and the breeze was starting to become cooler while the sun was out, it did look really nice out today too so… that counts, doesn't it? It definitely should, because this planet was beautiful, minus the minor-ish _skin infection_ that it's been having for a long time of course. The Kaioshin sighed, _I want some tea now_.

Ten minutes into him finessing his cup like he always does, the doorbell rung again and he made an audibly annoyed groan. This couldn't be anyone else this time, though it was something to note that the men came in nearly twenty minutes before Irene did. He went to the door and opened it briskly, grey eyes now looked at the smaller woman who had at least six bags of whatever-that-could-be in her arms. "Heyyy, Zamasu!"

He didn't say anything, he just mulishly nodded at her over-enthusiastic greeting and allowed her to step into house.

"Sorry I was out for a really long time, but I had to do some last minute shopping for certain things."

"Okay?" Why did he have to know this?

"I bought you some stuff too."

 _Oh_ , that's why he had to know.

"I know you and Adrian kind of have the same clothing size so shopping for you wasn't hard and I didn't get you anything that would look stupid, so…"

"Why would you buy me human clothes?"

" _Becauuuuse_ you're gonna be going to the airport with me and Rebecca tomorrow. I know without your armor-thingy on you look fine, but it's warm out, and you're wearing a sweater-" He gave her a look and she corrected herself. " _Gi_."

She pulled out a white button up shirt, and he was already getting uncomfortable. He'll have to deal with that unfamiliarity once again; casual clothing just wasn't something he could wear without feeling comfortable. It sounded pretty stupid but that's just how he was. She then pulled out a pair of khaki short cargos. "Put these on first. I got you some light joggers and like… sweatpants, and a few other tops and things."

He took hold of both of them, feeling the material which contrasted greatly with the material of his _gi_. He made a sound, and Irene turned around. "You gotta change in the dining room, okay. I know you have a nice body and all but that's not all for show, honey-"

His face whipped up real fast. "WHAT? I'M NOT- I WASN'T-" He took a deep breath and started grumbling under his breath about how she literally doesn't think before she speaks while walking off to the kitchen. Walking into the dining room, he proceeded to undo the top of his gi. "Why can't I just change upstairs?"

"Do you wanna walk up and down the stairs every time you get a new outfit?"

 _Probably not_. He just wanted to get this over with. Now fully unclothed except for an undergarment he was wearing, he looked down at the cargos and picked them up, inspecting its baggy form and the amount of pockets it adorned. _Why does it have so many pockets_? What kind of person would need for than two pockets on their pants? It didn't matter, he slid them on pretty easily and did the buckle for it, which was a shade of brown in color. He moved on to the shirt, and slid it on which looking down at the ground.

 _He's taking a really long time_ , three minutes have passed and Irene was leaning against the back of her couch on her phone. "Are you almost done?"

Her question was answered when she heard footsteps from outside of her dining room, and she looked up. "Oh…" The first thing that she had noticed was how amazingly _well_ the clothes fit him, especially his top. The shirt itself was made to hold and hug at the physique of whoever wore it, and for those with a build, the shirt would accentuate the appearance of their torso. Zamasu happened to have a slender, but gorgeously toned build; she could see the outlining of his pecs and his biceps and just… " _Damn_."

Zamasa raised a brow as Irene took a step forward. She smiled. "I did a good ass job picking out your getups! _God_ , you actually don't look that bad."

The rare ego-part of him wanted to say ' _Am I not supposed to?_ ' but he decided against that.

"Yep, you're definitely wearing this for tomorrow." And then she tilted her head, there was something off about his attire. Zamasu was standing with his hands behind his back like he normally would, in that same rigid and still poise that he always had, that was a part of the problem, but there was one more. She got up to him, frowning and making an exasperated sigh, and started touching his collar.

Zamasu instantly retaliated. "What are you-"

"Oh my gosh man, _loosen up_! Why would you button this all the way up? That's stiffy." The heck is that supposed to mean? Irene undid at least three button from his top and Zamasu cocked his neck back, not used to having a small portion of his clavicle, and his upper chest, exposed.

"Is that not how you're supposed to wear this?"

"Well, you _can,_ but…" she partially stood on the tips of her toes to fix his collar. "It's hot out and stuff. And buttoning that all the way up is just not gonna work, keep these undone for God's sake."

"Excuse you?"

"Okay; for _damn's_ sake." She corrected herself again, because this was a godly apprentice she was talking to so saying God's sake would be… weird? She didn't know. Now he was standing in front of her with a casually buttoned shirt and cargos on. The very upper part of his toned pecs were exposed. "See? Don't you feel a little loose and comfortable now?"

"I'm not comfortable at all." It was true; casual clothing was not something that he could adorn. The closest thing he's done to casual was taking off the outer part of his uniform, that's just about it.

"How come? You're just not used to being laid-back?" She went back into one of her bags to look for something. "You'll get used to it, fam."

He had gotten used to her referring to him as 'dude', 'bro', or 'fam' in the last three months, usually he would object but that would make him spend more time in this predicament. She had a simple silver necklace in her hand and she was planning on putting it on him, but when both of her hands reached upward, Zamasu gave her a look. "I'm not gonna hurt you, just let me put this on you."

 _Like you even can_. "Why?"

Irene shrugged with that stupid smile on her face. "Because it would look cool." She clipped it together and then took both of his hands, which he did snatch away from her at first, but then she told him to stop being so stiff. "Put your hands in your pockets. _Geez_."

Why was _she_ getting annoyed? "Why do you have such a problem with my posture?"

"Because it's formal and geeky! Just… let go for once, you know? _Now_ you look much nicer." Zamasu took a breath and looked to the side, his chest rising and falling as he did so. He could have stayed that way for longer until he started _feeling_ eyes on him. He slowly looked back at Irene to see her just staring at his outfit, or his body, and then she shook her head. "Alright, no." She went back up to him and started buttoning his shirt.

What the heck is wrong with her? First she didn't want him to completely button the shirt, and now she's buttoning it back up. "Didn't you say you _didn't_ want this thing to be completely unbuttoned? What are you doing?"

"I don't," she only did one button back again, anyway, "but you were starting to look… a little _too_ casual. Like, _sexy_ casual, almost, and it was just..."

His reaction was basically him kind of covering his chest and giving her a comically confused, and annoyed-flustered look. "Do you not think before you speak?"

"I do. That's why I said what I said. If you went out like that, I'm pretty sure there would be girls gazing at you."

That made his eye twitch. Like he would ever, **ever** , entertain the thought of wanting a human being attracted to him. That's disgusting, he even cringed at the thought. "Is this why you bought this for me? To make me look a certain way and get stared at?"

"No, no, I just thought it looked good and apparently, it looks _too good_ on you." Her head went down as she walked away, that made Zamasu's brows furrow. "But on to the next anyways. I'll give you another thingy to try on and you can go strip again." She inaudibly snickered at her choice of words, but since Zamasu was too innocent to understand such a connotation, he didn't object to it at all. She pulled out a grey v-neck muscle shirt with white abstract stripes on it and made an _'Ooooh'_ sound, because if he could rock a button up shirt with that kind of torse, then this one would look _superb_ on him. Then came a pair of black jeans with silver accents for the buttons along with a black belt that had a silver clump buckle. More than eager to see what he'd look like, she held the clothes out to him in alacrity. "Try _this_."

Zamasu took hold of them, and did as he need to. It took less time to change, and he stepped out smoothing out the shirt because he wasn't used to something that was both tight and comfy-

"I'm convinced that you could probably model with a body like that."

Unfamiliar with someone complimenting his body, he looked back at her with a face. "Stop staring at me like that!"

"Why? I'm complimenting you, you look good as fuck." She had to add 'as fuck' because just saying that he looks good would be a _giant_ understatement. But the fact that he was getting apprehensive about her telling him his body looks good was cute. She knew he was a dork.

"Watch your language." Because he had nothing else to rebuke with, so why not go for her choice of words?

"You get my drift, Zamasu." She went back into her bags. "I didn't buy much, but I did all of this so you'd have something a little more commonplace to wear. The weather is gonna be changing soon, since hoodie season is coming up."

"A 'what' season?" He kept smoothing out his muscle shirt for no reason.

Irene almost forgot that Zamasu didn't know 99% of the articles of clothing that were available to humans at the moment. "A hoodie is this." She pulled out a pale green hoodie with white accents. "I got it because it looks like you."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes but didn't say anything pertaining to that. "Is that all?"

"Didn't I say that there was more?" She looked back at him. "Besides, it's not even that much, so lemme just give you something else to try on. You'll be fine."

No he wouldn't.

And the reason why he thought that was because he had spent a good forty five minutes trying on at least fifteen different outfits. He had finally walked out of the kitchen with a sleeveless dark blue hoodie and light camo joggers. It wasn't a tight fit either, it exposed his toned arms and the very sides of his chest. "Why did you buy me so much clothes?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Didn't I already explain why?"

"You did, but I'm not staying here forever. There is no point of buying me so much clothing if I'm going to be gone in nine months." He had the urge to put his hands behind his back again, but due to how loose and fitting the outfits were on him, he started to feel weird every time he did so.

Irene cocked her head to the side. "Wouldn't it be nice to get something every once in awhile, Zee-Zee?"

 _Again with the stupid nicknames_. "My name is not Zee-Zee, nor is it Lettuce or Wasabi. I am Zamasu!"

Irene snorted, she had never heard Zamasu say any of her nicknames but because of his way of speaking _proper_ , it made it way funnier than she could imagine. "I know that, but don't you think Zee-Zee sounds cute?"

He straight-faced her. " _No_."

Irene sighed. "Well, _fine_ then. I tried." She had already sorted out the bags of Zamasu's clothes and hers, so all she needed was to take them upstairs and put them into their respective drawers. Taking hold of the bags, Irene started to go upstairs, and then she stopped midway to lean back and look at the Kaioshin. "Are you gonna leave that on?"

Zamasu looked up at her and back down at himself, and then fast-walked back into the dining room. Within fifteen seconds, he came back out in his gi with his new clothes in hand, and returned them to her. She chuckled. " _Alrighty then_."

Her first destination was Zamasu's room, where she walked in and automatically started putting his folded new clothes in his drawer. Luckily for her since he was already a neat person, she didn't have to do anything extracurricular in his room. Irene knew that when she left, she didn't really do the _best_ handiwork in her room, due to being a little too busy to attempt to clean up her room. It wasn't that bad when she left, anyways- _that was a lie_ , her clothes were just scrambled everywhere since all she would do was throw her clothing wherever and then semi-vow to pick it up later. And later apparently never came. _That sucks_.

Irene really wouldn't dread having to clean her own room, her bed was legit _right there_ , and she prefolded all of her new assets. Zamasu's drawer was now fixed up, and she moved on to her own room getting ready to behold the glorious sight of all the random assortments of clothing that were left scattered on her floor-

She opened her room door, and blinked. And then she tilted her head. And then she frowned. Her floor was clean of all of the clothes and shoes, her clothes sat neatly folded on top of her bed, while even her shoes were placed on their shoe rack. She smirked, there was _no other person_ in the whole world who could've done all of this in the time that she was gone. Irene slowly walked in and placed her bags down, a smile growing on her face with every step she took.

Meanwhile, Zamasu was looking in the fridge for no reason, taking out the velvety box of chocolates and truffles that sat in her fridge and placing them on her kitchen counter for no reason. He continued to stare at the box for like fifteen seconds, reaching at it reluctantly but acquisitive, thinking of very contradicting thoughts in his head, all for no reason. And then he finally grabbed hold of the box, opening it to fully reveal the pieces of chocolate that it consisted, and picking it up one of the small pieces that had the design of a swirl on top of it and staring at it, for _no reason_. Even though the very rheumatic part of him partially was yelling at him to put the small chocolate back in the box, he still held it in his hand, and it was slowly getting closer to his mouth.

For _some_ reason, he ended up biting into the tempered, sweet and milky chocolate, relishing in its amazing taste and how it hugged every single taste bud in his mouth. And then after he had completely ingested the little piece of heaven, he stood there and questioned his overall rectitude.

 _Why…_ why is it getting harder to...resist things, in a sense? Zamasu found it progressively difficult to suppress just how much he admires Earth food (he refuses to say human food) and he had found out only recently that cute animals were his _weakness_. Before all of this happened, Zamasu was strictly whom he knew he was; a pupil of Gowasu who held no impure desires, who still has excellent fighting skills and has excelled far ahead of most, if not all, Kaioshins at his young age, and who had set strict and stable judgements and mindsets for millenias. And now he was getting introduced to things that he had never done before, thinking things that he had never thought before, and _doing_ things that he had never done before. Since when would he ever eat a piece of chocolate out of someone else's house and question why he was eating it while subconsciously knowing the answer as to why?

He looked down at the box. Aside from irritation, he really didn't know what he was feeling day to day, specially when he's doing an activity outside of either reading, making tea, or not socializing with anyone. There were too many conflicting thoughts going on in his head, and a lot of it didn't make sense, but made sense at the same time. Does that make sense?

Once again, it does in Zamasu's head.

The box still sat in front of him, and he slowly went for another, as if he was going to be castigated for eating chocolate. Deep down, he really knew it wouldn't matter, but he was still reluctant because taking something that's not declared as _his_ is so unfamiliar to him. And at the same time, these chocolates tastes so _good_ \- You know what, forget it; He might as well enjoy these little treats while he was there. It's not like he'd just eat two of them in the miniscule timespan of him thinking all of this…

But he ate like four. _Like_.

The sound of rapid footsteps going down the stairs interrupted his thought and _eating_ process, and by some weird instinct, he returned the box back into the fridge at an incredible speed. He looked up to see Irene smiling at him, she leaned against the wall resting her temple against her knuckles. "You went into my room today, didn't you?"

He didn't answer, he just looked to the side because it wouldn't help if he said 'No' anyway. She still continued. "That's not the issue here. Did you fold my clothes for me?"

"No I didn't."

"That's a lie, isn't it?" She strutted towards him until she was right in front of him. "No one else lives in this house, it was obviously you. Don't lie to me, Z."

His lips pursed when she used another alias for him. "Alright, I did go into your room and organized your belongings."

Her smile got even bigger. "Awww, I didn't know that you cared for little tired me. I didn't think I was gonna be able to reorganize everything either because I was so tired. That's so sweet of you."

He scoffed. "I didn't do it because of you. " And then he turned around with his arms crossed, head facing upwards and eyes closed. "I just walked in and saw how unorganized everything was, and because I am a God, I cleaned everything up, because Gods are not fond of _clutter_ , unlike you _humans_. You all don't know the _value of cleanliness_ -" Out of nowhere, unintentionally, he started to laugh. And then he quickly stopped laughing, and to cover up his inner confusion as to why he laughed, he said in a scoffing manner. "It's lowly."

Irene narrowed her eyes. " _Riiight_ , I understand. I promise that I'll keep my room clean, _Mister God_." She walked past him, and his train of thought stopped when he smelled that same beautiful scent of vanilla that he had a whiff of earlier. He opened his eyes to see Irene looking into the fridge, and making a sound as she observed the contents. She pulled out that same box that Zamasu, like a genius, forgot to close completely, and turned around and looked at him with a knowing smile on her face.

And the Kaioshin himself frowned at her accusingly. "What?"

She looked down at the chocolates; there used to be seven of them left in there, ever since James bought them for her, now there were only two. Brown eyes then reverted their gaze into grey ones. "You're so bad at covering your own tracks, dude."

He just turned and walked towards something else like he always does. "Who says I was trying to hide anything?" This was so unlike him.

"You usually would, though." She frowned, but smirked. "I'm surprised, you gotten more confident in showing how much you appreciate our food." He didn't say anything once again, he just stared outside through her new glass door. She decided to be a little lenient, even though she was craving chocolate at the moment, she held the entire box in her hands and went up to Zamasu, sitting next to him on the countertop. He raised an eyebrow, and she took one piece of chocolate that was filled with caramel on the inside and held it out to Zamasu. "Here."

He looked at her weirdly. "..."

She sighed. "Just _take it_ , there's no need to act all stoic."

Slowly reaching out to hold the chocolate in his hand, he looked at it and looked back at Irene who was looking at him expectedly. He placed the whole piece into his mouth and then bit into it and his face went from awkwardly aloof to completely taken aback. He suddenly had this syrupy, sweet substance swirling in his mouth, and it _magnified_ the milky taste of the chocolate. Just what in the world _was_ this thing?

"That chocolate was filled with caramel." His inner question was answered. He swallowed the remaining heavenly bits of chocolate in his mouth, and blinked two times. He slowly looked back at her, and then down at the last piece of chocolate that laid in the box on her lap. She followed his gaze, and looked back at him. "That's mine."

He frowned. Normally, Zamasu would just eat what she gave him and then leave. But today, he wasn't doing that at all. He seemed to be more… loose? More open, in a sense? How the heck did this happen? _It's the clothes, it's probably the clothes_. "That's yours?"

She nodded. "I gave you one, and you ate like six, including that last shit. So, this is reserved for me, thank you very much."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes, continuing to look at Irene while she took the small chocolate out of the box. As it drew closer to her lips, Zamasu silently raised his hand a little above his own lap, and right before it would've entered her mouth, Irene found that her fingertips were touching her lips instead of the chocolate. "Huh?" She frowned looking down at her hand, the chocolate wasn't there anymore. She looked to her left, which is where Zamasu is, and he was holding that same piece of chocolate in between his fingertips with a small smirk on his face. "HEY!"

He slightly winced at the sudden loudness of her voice. "Keep your voice down."

"You can't be doing magic tricks with my food. Give it back!"

She got down for her seat, and went to get her chocolate. But Zamasu decided to be a dick once more; he delicately held the piece between his fingers, and raised his arm up high, simply because she would be too short to reach his hand. She stopped and straight-faced, crossing her arms. "You're an asshole."

"I don't think so."

She pouted, and if Zamasu didn't hate her, he would have thought that she looked cute. "Fine. Go ahead and eat it..." Irene turned around, whipping her hair in his face and hitting his nose with that same but more potent vanilla scent again, and he resisted the urge to close his eyes and take the scent in completely. Why would you smell someone's hair when they're turning away from you? That's weird. He was a little confused as to why she didn't fight for it that much, but he still chewed on the chocolate nonetheless.

"You're not having anything for dinner."

He objected immediately, even though he was a God and didn't need food to sustain himself at all and also proclaimed that he didn't care about food anyway. "You can't tell me what I can and can't have."

"You've said that before, and yes I can." She put her hands on her hips. "Try me."

Zamasu crossed his arms, and blinked. "Is that so? Have you forgotten how powerful I am, or do I need to remind you of what happened to your mate?"

She pursed her lips. "I know you wouldn't do what you did to James to me."

"Why would you say that?"

"Am I about to fight you? Nope. So you wouldn't put your hands on me."

He frowned and cocked his neck back. "And what does this have to do with that?"

She smiled. "It has _a lot_ to do with that."

She's playing mind games on him again. "Fair enough." He started to leave the kitchen, and back upstairs to his room to read a book. He plopped down against his bed, and then sat back up when he realized that he just leaned against the bed instead of sitting upright against it. That was weird… he's becoming more and more comfortable, even if he didn't want to admit it, staying here and thinking in different ways was starting to have an effect on his persona. Rather, on his usual rigidity, physically, mentally, and emotionally. He opened a page of a relatively short encyclopedia, he need to get his mind off of this, off of all of this _change_ , because he knows that it is something that he is definitely not familiar with.

But he'll get used to it.

 **l¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦l**

Overnight, and right now early in the morning, Zamasu was laying peacefully on the grass of Irene's backyard. Irene packed his clothing inside of a luggage bag the night before, because he was supposed to leave her house the day after, a.k.a today. A part of him was going to miss this backyard and the wonderful view and vibes it gave off, being able to lay here whenever he wanted to relax or if he was tired of hearing Irene's voice. The bright side of this entire ordeal is that he wouldn't have to hear her for a month, but that didn't mean he was going to his Kaishin realm anytime soon.

Now that he thought about it, so much more had occurred within the past three months, compared to a random snippet of a hundred, or maybe even a thousand years in his life. He read so much about Earth and its inhabitants, got to wander around meadows and forests, sent some criminal to jail, went out to an ice cream parlor and tried ice cream for the first time, learned that he had a guilty pleasure-esque thing for chocolate, actually found a _tolerable_ human being to be around, and discovered that seeing a dog pout would make him succumb to anything. And speaking of which, his relocation would mean he'd spend more time with Ollie and Loki-

That could be a plus, because Zamasu wouldn't lie to himself and say that those two dogs were not adorable. He heard the sound of the kitchen door opening, and assumed that it was just Irene coming out to badger him again, so he ignored it initially. The Kaioshin could only imagine how much Ollie was going to jump around in his arms, and more than likely lick his face once more-

He felt a small bit of pressure against his chest for a couple of seconds, he frowned as it shifted and felt four places on his torso of where this pressure resided, until finally his lower abdomen felt like it was being sat on. At first, he thought it was Irene sitting on him for some strange and moronic reason, but he knew that the biracial woman wasn't this light. He opened his eyes and was taken aback to see a really up-close-and-personal pair of giant brown eyes stare back at him for one second, and the owner of said brown eyes barked happily as he nudged Zamasu's face. It was Ollie.

Zamasu started to chuckle at the enthusiasm of the pug on top of him, and reached up to pet him lightly on the head. Ollie responded with, and he spoke too soon on this one, licking his face once again.

"Ack- Okay, _okay_ , Ollie can you please… calm do-" The pug was far too excited to stop any further, so Zamasu held him and sat up with Ollie in his lap. In an endearing manner, Ollie laid on his back with his paws wriggling in front of him, and since his neck was really small, this position made him look like he had ridiculously giant smile on his face. Zamasu narrowed his eyes and took a breath, _this_ is what he meant by being weak to _cute_ things. "You are really excited to see me…"

"He is."

He turned around to see none other than the dog's owner herself; Rebecca was leaning against the door with Irene watching on along at the kinship between a God and a dog. "How cute." Irene laughed at the sight wholeheartedly.

Zamasu raised a brow at the both of them. "Why are you awake so early? And how come you're here?" He looked respectively to each individual woman in front of him as he addressed his question.

"I have to leave today Zamasu, remember? I reminded you yesterday evening." That didn't really answer his question. "The plane would leave at least four hours from now, and we have to get ready pretty early in order to settle in for my flight."

"And it also gets pretty crowded in there sometimes." Rebecca added in. "It's only 6:20-ish in the morning."

Irene looked at her best friend. "Rebecca, it's pretty damn early if you ask me."

She smiled. "Well true, but I'm sure Zamasu can go a long time without sleeping anyway."

Zamasu clarified her response. "I don't sleep at all."

"See? He has no problem with the time." Rebecca looked back at him. "And I also brought Ollie with me, because he didn't want to stay home. Once I said 'I am going to get Zamasu', he got super excited and followed me as I changed." She laughed. "Loki is still asleep. He stayed up pretty late last night."

"He only saw him once, and he is that comfortable with him?" Irene looked to Rebecca. Her friend may have explained the incident where he was playing with Ollie, but she didn't expect them to be _that_ close in such a long time.

"Ollie could tell good people from bad people when he smells them." This elicited a slight snort from her curly haired friend.

"I'm not surprised…" Zamasu gave Irene an inquisitive look. What did she mean by that? The way she said that sounded like she had ulterior knowledge of him. Irene looked down at the Kaioshin with a dog in his arms. "You gotta get ready soon, Z." She started to leave the kitchen and whispered the her friend. "I'm over here in nothing but a romper."

Rebecca sneered. "Literally nothing underneath that?"

Irene looked back at Rebecca with narrowed eyes, and placed a finger over her own mouth. " _Shhhhhhh…_ " With that, she dashed upstairs to change. Rebecca turned back around when she felt two paws against her lower thigh.

"What is it?"

A bark.

"Yes, he's coming with us, and so is Irene." She then knelt down to rub Ollie's head. "You get to spend a whole month with your best buddy!"

The Kaioshin raised a finger. "Uhh, wait a minute-" He was interrupted, Ollie ran back to him, and started licking Zamasu's face again.

"Ollie, stop licking his face." Rebecca reprimanded him sternly, and after two more licks to his cheek to pug complied. "What is it?" She fully stepped outside and stood near him.

Zamasu opened his mouth to speak, but felt the saliva around his face, and he raised his hand, nonchalantly brandishing a handkerchief out of thin air which made Rebecca jump, and started wiping his face. "Woah! How the hell did you do _that_?"

He looked up at her, and realized that he was in Earth, so magical powers like this were beyond supernatural to humans. "I am a Kaio. We are the creators of the world, so I can just summon whatever I want whenever I want."

" _Whaaaaat_? That's friggin' crazy." She sat down next to him twiddling a piece of grass in her finger. "So if you wanted like, I dunno, a sword, you could just create one _like that_?"

"Precisely." He answered her as though this were a conversation about the weather. "But I wouldn't really need to make a sword in any situation regardless."

The intrigued red-haired woman raised a brow. "How come-"

She finished her question right when Zamasu's hand turned a vibrant, motile purple color which coated his wrist up to above his fingertips. His thumb was positioned facing his palm, and he moved his energy-bladed hand around. "This is a God Split Cut. It serves the same properties as any sword would." Except better.

Rebecca just blinked several times, her awed expression became borderline comical. "What in the fuck…?"

Zamasu looked at her. " _Language_."

"I'm so sorry, it's just… _what is that_?"

"It is a blade conjured up with aura. It can cut anything that comes into contact with it." He dispersed the aura around his hand, letting it disappear completely, and proceeded to feel the side of his palm, as if he was sheathing a tangible sword into his hand.

"...That's sick." She pointed at his hand. "Although I hope you don't pull that out again, because Ollie got a little scared." During him showing her his God Split Cut, Ollie jumped from his lap back to Rebecca's. She looked down at him and rubbed the back of his tiny ear, he looked up at his owner. "Don't worry, baby."

"I won't. I don't think I'd have to use it, anyway." Besides, if a human actually musters up the _foolishness_ to actually fight him, he wouldn't even need to use any of his Shin granted powers. He could probably flick a man and render him unconscious, or launch him into the air and make him land into a lake.

Rebecca was checking the time on her phone, her green eyes lighting up as she looked at the screen. Despite her curiosity towards Zamasu's powers piquing her up, they had somewhere to be at this early in the morning. "I think it's time for you to get ready. We need to leave at like 7."

Zamasu sighed. "Do I really have to? I'd rather not go."

"It'd be easier to take you to my place if you'd come with us because I wouldn't have to drive back here. And besides…" she leaned forward, doing this little dance with her shoulders. "There's food. Lots of food."

He straight-faced. "First your friend, and now you? You really think that food entices me that much?"

She sheepishly smiled. "Kinda..."

He found her timbre amusing. "That's not going to cut it at all."

"Well," the Kaioshin intuitively glanced down at her hands, where Ollie was sitting quietly. "Ollie would be really upset if you decided not to join him in the car ride." Rebecca smiled, and just to make matters worse, she looked down and held Ollie's front paws. "Isn't that right, Ollie? Would you be upset if Zamasu didn't join you in the car?" He looked up at his owner's green eyes, and made a high pitched bark. "See? That would _really_ upset him."

"He has you and her in there. He'll be fine without me." He crossed his arms. "I simply do not want to go." Ollie's face when back to Zamasu and he closed his eyes and looked to the left. Not because he was showing defiance, but because he internally kept repeating _do not look at him, do not look at him, do not look at him_ in his head. He heard the sound of a sad yap from him and felt the small pug move his way into his lap. _Do not open your eyes, do not look down..._

And then he felt two tiny paws against both of his shoulders. Ollie was at face-level with him, and Rebecca smirked. "Are you just gonna ignore him like that? That's not nice, Zamasu."

Zamasu dared to open one gray eye to look ahead of him, and only found the pudgy face of Ollie right in front of him. He opened both of his eyes completely, he could withstand this. He could definitely withstand those big, brown eyes and… that mushy snout along with the sad sounds he was making while his mouth was all pouty and adorable and unbearable and-

He finally broke. "Fine, I'll go change now." He took Ollie from his lap and placed him on the ground, stood up, and went back into the house. When he entered his room, he noticed that the clothes that Irene wanted him to wear yesterday was already sitting out for him. He inhaled deeply, and went on to undress himself.

After a relatively short shower, and some time to change, Irene stepped out of her room wearing white jeans, and a tucked in light blue flannel with sepia brown heeled wedges. She had both suitcases in hand, and she placed one on the top of the stairs while bringing the other one down. She didn't wear much makeup, truthfully she barely ever does because she's just naturally pretty, and adorned a pair of gold hoop earrings that accented her giant fro. Irene would have sent a picture to James in her outfit but she decided it would best be a surprise, the prominent curvature of her well-kept body would catch his eyes, _and he'd definitely wish I wasn't going to be away for a month_. Rebecca was downstairs in the living room with Ollie laying Sphinx-style on carpet rug. "What time is it?"

"It's 6:45. We got a good fifteen minutes." Rebecca stood up from the couch. "You need help?"

"There's another one upstairs, can you get it for me?" Irene started to approach her door.

"Sure, here's my keys. Just open the back trunk and place them in, there should be enough room to fit yours and Zamasu's stuff in there." She tossed the keys at Irene, who sort of caught them, and then they dropped to the floor.

"Shut up." She couldn't help the smile on her face as she picked up the keys and left her house. Rebecca on the other hand went to get Irene's second suitcase and join her in placing the suitcases into her car trunk. Ollie watched the two women move in an out of the house, and he looked upstairs to where Rebecca once was. Wasting no time, he went upstairs and sauntered through the hallway sniffing the ground. Once he reached a particular door which he intuitively knew that the green Kaioshin was in, the door itself opened to reveal Zamasu holding his books and wearing his new outfit. Ollie looked up at him, reaching up on his hind legs until his front paws were against his mid thigh. Zamasu couldn't help but chuckle at the cuteness below him, and reached down to pick Ollie up and allowed him to rest against his head against his right bicep. Zamasu looked down at his own outfit, he'll have to be walking around in _this_ attire, looking as commonplace as the major species populating the Earth right now. It made sense though; even though he didn't particularly fancy the idea of wearing human clothes to temporarily assimilate, he wouldn't have liked it if humans stared at him excessively.

He made it downstairs and decided to let Ollie run off on his own, he placed him back down on the ground. Zamasu looked around the living room with his hands against his hips, he turned just in time to see the two laughing woman stop in their tracks, Rebecca in particular.

"Oh… _Damn_." Rebecca blinked, still in awe. "He looks… You're looking _good_ , Zamasu."

Surprisingly enough, Zamasu didn't button his shirt all the way, so it left his neck and upper chest exposed, that didn't give any sort of leeway to the lean, toned body that was cloaked underneath the shirt. Even though the Kaioshin just walked around casually as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on, both Irene and Rebecca couldn't help but watch him as he went along, returning his books back to her bookshelf, crouching down in front of Ollie and petting him as the pug felt against his black low tops, and standing back up to his full height. He glanced at the two and then did another take when he fully realized they were watching him.

He was completely oblivious to the aesthetic of his outfit. "Can you two stop staring at me?"

"Umm…" Rebecca scratched the back of her head, looking down slightly flustered as she turned away and Irene just smirked.

"I can't help it. I wish I could vouch for you but since you're a dude and you have this whole _fresh_ getup on, I have nothing else to do but glue my eyes on you." She shrugged, she wasn't lying. "You'll find that a lot of that is going to happen today. Did you bring your suitcase?"

He realized that he had forgotten his clothes upstairs. He packed his gi in the suitcase as well because he probably couldn't go an entire day without wearing it. "Oh." He went back upstairs quickly, and came back within a matter of seconds, which did shock the two females but they didn't say anything. "Are you going to leave now?"

Irene kissed her teeth. "Well, you're so eager to see me leave the country, aren't you?"

" _Yes_." He wasn't playing any games.

"I would love to make you two reubke each other all day, but it's 6:55 now. We gotta go now."

"Fine." Irene took her keys and her bag, opening the door and stepping out. "Zamasu, do you wanna sit in the front seat or in the back?"

"Isn't that seat reserved for you ' _at all times'_?" Rebecca quoted the mixed woman, and turned to Zamasu. "I'm pretty sure if you sit in the front, Ollie won't be able to stay in the back for more than ten seconds. Is that cool?"

She still had that weird glint in her eyes, but Zamasu answered nonetheless. "I don't have a problem with seat arrangements." He looked down at Ollie, who was sitting up. His body was all pudgy and his face was scrunched up due to his neck being craned downwards. Ollie met his eyes and did the trademark head-tilt, and Zamasu just nodded while internally holding his composure together.

They exited the house, placing Zamasu's suitcase into the back of Rebecca's car, got in and peeled off the driveway. Irene was sitting in the front seat, like she said she would, and Zamasu was in the back either looking out the window, or watching Ollie gnaw on a toy. He had just realized that this car ride might be really, really long, and he'd have to listen to the sound of Irene and Rebecca chatting their mouths off this early in the morning. What could they possibly be talking about? He tuned in to their conversation fully, and heard James' name being said along with his.

Involuntarily, he voiced himself. "What?"

"Irene was telling me about how you and James kinda fought and she had to blast the both of you to stop." Rebecca looked at inner car mirror while she spoke to him.

"She's wrong." A sudden point-dexter-esque behavior came about him. "She didn't even come close to hitting me. That ki blast of yours was far too small."

"Ya know," Irene turned to him, "I could have made it much bigger, but let's not forget the fact that a) this happened in _my_ backyard and b) I couldn't because I was just about to get in the mood with my man, and you came in and fucked everything up!"

Zamasu didn't notice the change in Rebecca's eyes in the car mirror because he, once again, did not understand the connotation of Irene's second point at first. "What?" And then he remembered, _unfortunately_ , the scene of James' shirt unbuttoned and Irene's loose cleavage-exposing romper. "What does _that_ have to do with your ability to make a ki blast?"

"It has lots to do with it!" She got a little offended at the way his voice grew disappointed when he mentioned her make-out session with her boyfriend. "You try getting a hard-on while being with someone you love and then performing a ki blast, then we can see eye-to-eye."

His sleek, white eyebrows furrowed. "A what?"

Once again, Irene made the unintentional mistake of referring to sexual things the way she would with her friends. It amazed her just how much this man, this _more-than-tens-of-thousands of years_ old man, didn't know or couldn't figure out what certain things meant. "Look, you have a penis, don't you?"

"Irene!" She looked at her friend, and Zamasu grimaced.

"See? Even Rebecca objects to how liberal your choice of words are!"

"No, no, it's not that, it's just… I kind of didn't want to hear a response to that." She shook her head.

Irene frowned at her friend. "You afraid he's gonna say 'no'?"

"Well, uhh…" She changed up her timbre. "I know I'm a doctor and all, but you talking about getting erections and asking him if he has a dick is just… too much." _For me, and probably you_.

Zamasu's confusion was cleared. Oh, so _that's_ what she meant. "Why couldn't you just say that instead of saying what you said earlier?"

"Because I didn't actually think that you _wouldn't_ understand what a hard-on was in the first place." Irene raised her hand, lightly resting her elbow against her waist. "But, now that you understand what I'm saying, I'm certain such a thing would affect your ki blasts, wouldn't they?"

Rebecca was the only person who consciously realized that Zamasu's response entailed that he did have what Irene was asking about. He spoke matter-of-factly with his arms crossed. "Well _no_ , because gods do not fall for silly temptations like lust. We have impeccable control over our energy, and I wouldn't be affected either way."

Irene raised a brow. "Lust?" Then her eyes narrowed because of his connotation. He made it sound like any form of loving intimacy did not exist between her and James, especially with his choice of words. "What do you mean by that?"

"Do you not know what lust is?"

"Well, I do. But if you love someone, then such strong feelings would occur. It doesn't have to be lust."

The two women did not expect Zamasu to come out so brazenly with his next statement. And he literally flat out said this without any form of malice in is voice. "In your case, it is lust."

Rebecca shifted her eyes, and Irene frowned, her voice suddenly becoming quiet. "What?"

Zamasu looked at her. "What?" Truthfully, he didn't say that to be demeaning in any way towards her, it was just an observation he made.

She was really calm, and that scared Rebecca. It's not like she'd get insecure about James at all, and Rebecca knew Irene wasn't, it's just that Zamasu voiced an opinion that has never been stated before. "You've only been in my house for three months and have seen James twice in that amount of time with me, and you conclude that our relationship is lustful?"

The way her voice was so eerily calm made Zamasu uncross his arms. "That's what it looks like to me."

Rebecca turned into an exit lane out of the hallway. She glanced at Irene, who was still inquisitive over Zamasu's claim. Irene tilted her head. "What would you know about such a thing?"

There was a big difference in the way the two were speaking right now. Usually, it would be Zamasu speaking in a condescending, almost defensive yet nonchalant manner and Irene would respond to him in an obvious way. In Rebecca's car today, however, such dynamic was _switched_ between the Kaioshin and her best friend. Zamasu looked her up and down and cocked his neck back. "Do I need to remind you that I have been living far longer than you have? I have more than enough wisdom to tell the difference."

Rebecca can tell that Zamasu's words were actually hitting Irene in the wrong place, and judging from his tone of voice, he wasn't trying to pick at her integrity at all. It was a subtle difference in their speech, something that you'd have to really use your head and ears in order to pick it up. She could have interrupted the two with a different topic, but she wanted to see just how far this will go. It would serve as something she could look at over time, especially on behalf of Irene's boyfriend; they had a history together, one that had nothing to do with intimacy and everything to do with jealousy, revenge and sex, all of which were very bad mixes for a woman who's been hurt many times over.

"As far as I know, you've never been intimate with anyone. I highly doubt you could even be that way since you're so rigid all the time." Irene turned around, still calm, while Zamasu's neck remained cocked back in surprise.

She didn't say that in her usual sarcastic, light-hearted tone. She sounded really, really insulted and Zamasu started to pick out clues and indicators as to why she got so worked up over such an obvious observation. It was all emotional, she simply was emotionally invested in the idea that what she had with James was love, and the Kaioshin was far too intuitive to think that those two could feel such strong feelings. But he still voiced an inquiry, despite most likely knowing the answer to it. "Is there a reason as to why you're so uptight?"

" _You guysssss_ , we are forty-ish minutes away from the hospital as of now." Rebecca's light voice sliced through the tense air sitting between the two being in her car. "So just sit tight and umm… I think it's gonna be really nice outside." _I really suck at trying to quell situations_.

"Fifty minutes?!" Irene's eyebrows raised. "We've been in the hour for more than an hour. Aren't we going to West City's airport?"

"Yes, but in the middle of us chatting Irene, there was a detour on the highway earlier and I had to take the other one. I took an exit lane short after." Usually, by this time they would be around fifteen minutes away, just far enough to see a small portion of the airport's building.

"Why?" The Kaioshin in the back looked out the window to see that they entered another highway.

"There were some cars causing a ruckus back there. And it was those black vans again." Rebecca shook her head.

Luckily for the red-headed woman, Irene sensed that she didn't want her and Zamasu to dwell in their conversation any further. So she went on as if what had happened never took place. "I've been seeing reports on them over the course of a month, and yet nobody knows where they came from."

That was also the reason why Rebecca didn't want to wake Loki up so he could embark on this trip with Ollie and Zamasu. The black vans were becoming more and more prominent, and she wouldn't allow Loki to suffer another anxiety attack. "I did hear somewhere that this could be an underground organized crime syndicate. At first, they would roll around West City not really doing anything, and after a week, almost every crime report on the news has involved a black van."

"They did vandalize the sign on the hospital you worked at."

Rebecca's hand got so tense against the steering wheel that even Zamasu looked a little concerned. "I saw that… on the news while I was at home." That was a lie, Rebecca knew it was. "It was removed soon after, though. The news didn't get to show what it said." _Thank fucking god it didn't_ , Rebecca could have exhaled after saying that.

The person sitting behind her, however, _just so happened_ to be telepathic. And Zamasu usually didn't enable this ability all the time, however, it _just so happened_ that he caught the inner uneasiness within Rebecca's mind. "What did it say?"

Rebecca's eyes flickered to the car mirror for less than half a second. "I dunno what it said, I was at home when this happened."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes at her. Good thing Rebecca couldn't meet his gaze because she was too busy looking at the road. Usually when someone is suppressing a thought from being voiced, they end up thinking about what that exact thing is. Zamasu could only pick up her being grateful that the news did not show what the sign said, not the actual vandalization itself. He was surprised, Rebecca had great control over her thoughts.

"Have you noticed that all of this happened soon after George Samos was put in jail? Like, not even an entire month after his arrest, and these vans start showing up. Don't you think it's correlative?"

How funny it would be to figure out that Zamasu inadvertently catching a criminal on his own time was the cataclysm for this widespread soon-to-be epidemic of crime sprees. The Kaioshin wasn't any more satisfied with that idea, in fact it _disgusted_ him greatly that such an event ended up gaining its own positive feedback; the stopping of one perpetual crime leading to a rise of many others.

Rebecca looked down at her mileage. "I really want to hope it isn't. That guy is already known to be tied in with many other _goons_ ," both Irene and Zamasu reckoned the way she spat out that word, "so it's not surprising that they'd pull through with so much backlash."

There was a burning question brewing in Zamasu's head. "Are there not others out there to stop this?"

Irene looked up out the front window. "There are; I've seen more policeman around the streets today than I would the week before Samos' arrest. The thing is, most of these guys are like cockroaches; they just keep pouring in no matter how many times you take them down."

This was the first time Zamasu actually _agreed_ with what Irene was saying for once. He bounced back mentally, realizing the fundamental behavior he was exhibiting. How could he agree with someone he didn't like?

"Don't they not understand, that committing shitty crimes isn't going to solve anything? Their asshole 'friend' is in jail, doing all of this won't free him at all." Rebecca was actually starting to get riled up, because it made no sense to her at all. She momentarily forgot about the vandalization topic and only lamented on behalf of the herd-like mentality that people end up having.

"I don't think it has much to do with Samos being in jail." In conjunction to what she was saying, Irene reached out to gently grasp her friend's forearm reassuringly. "Maybe it's some form of looting that they are doing. They probably salvaged all the stuff he had, and are now using them to their own advantage. They don't give a shit about George."

"But still," she regarded Irene's hand. "What causes people to go out and hurt one another?"

If Zamasu really wanted to, he could have _went the fuck in_ on how he could ask that question a million times and still not get a concrete answer on behalf of it, and that's what irritated him the most. "Arrogance."

He said one simple word, and Irene turned around in acknowledgement. To be truthful, she had been waiting for Zamasu to throw in all the insults and judgements he always had on the human race after hearing about the upsurge in crime rates, and was surprised that he uttered only _one_ adjective compared to the many others she heard from him. He continued on, "These people go about being delinquents because they think they _can_. _Demons_ strengthen in numbers."

"Deadass." Irene agreed. "That's probably why they weren't doing much for the first couple of weeks. If they started this earlier, the West City police would have cut their shit off."

"They can't do much shit, though. I'm sure they'll all be stymied in no time." Rebecca took a deep breath as she encountered a stop light. "On a lighter note," she chuckled, "We are almost at the airport. How is Ollie doing back there? He's been silent for a long time."

All three of them looked at pug, who had spent almost all of this time playing with a wooden puzzle board. Any time he got the random puzzle correct, there would be a popup indicating his success, and right now the pug was far too concentrated to notice all three of the adults staring at him. His tiny paws would tap against one of the wooden buttons, giant brown eyes looking down determined to make the toy pop up again. He made a tiny inquisitive sound when he slid one of the pieces with nothing to be emitted, which was the only sound that lifted the silence in the car.

Finally, Rebecca decided to bring Ollie's focus out of toy, mainly because it was broken and no longer was able to pop up. "Ollie!"

The pug yipped and jumped so high that he fell behind his seat and landed on Zamasu's suitcase in the trunk. Both females laughed at his reaction, but something else concurrently caught their attention; Zamasu was laughing _too_. This was the first time either Rebecca or Irene have heard him remotely laugh ever since they knew him. Would it be weird for Irene to think that his laugh actually sounded cute?

But like almost anything cherishable, his laughter ceased within seconds when he saw Irene looking at him. He cleared his throat, now that he had stopped he felt weird and unfamiliar again, and it was a frustrating feeling at best. There was nothing to attach this lingering feeling to, so he internally blamed it on Irene's presence because that is always a good argument and the best possible conclusion he could muster.

The author could digress.

The light turned green, and Rebecca turned just in time to see the transition of the stoplight. Not even one second after the light turned green, some car behind her beeped _twice_.

"Who the heck is that?" Irene rolled her eyes in regards to the impatient driver behind them.

Rebecca frowned and scoffed, accelerating leisurely. "I dunno, what a fucking plank." She looked at her car mirror to Zamasu, who was now sitting quietly looking down at the floor. "Why did you stop laughing? Shy of letting us hear you laugh?"

That's literally the first thing Rebecca asked of him when she first saw him. "No, it's just…" he didn't answered her completely, because Ollie raised his paw in the air and Zamasu looked to the fallen pug to pick him back up. Rebecca was about to press the subject even further when she looked into the rearview mirror to see that the person who beeped at her could not be seen from their own car. Matter of fact, this vehicle happened to be a black van. She slowly started to press harder on the acceleration, which Zamasu felt the slight increase immediately. He didn't particularly like reading people's minds, but he sensed her nervousness pretty easily. Not only that, but this was a great way to evade her question completely. "What's the problem?"

"Rebecca, you're near speeding. I don't want you to get a ticket over-" Irene stopped, looking past Rebecca and out her window to see a black van roll by right next to their vehicle. Zamasu caught sight of this, immediately gaining the answer to his question.

"Don't look, 'Rene. Lemme peel off of here." Rebecca checked her six and looked forward, and then switched lanes. Since there was a truck in front of her, when she switched lanes the truck covered her car from the sight of the black van. She steadied her car in that position until she reached the final exit lane, and then she made her designated turn and leaving while the truck still covered the black van's sight.

"Rebecca, I know you don't like these guys but…" Irene shifted in her seat, "You look worried."

"Well, I mean, these van-people commit a bunch of crimes-"

"No, I mean you look really worr- like _anxious_ , it was unnatural too." Zamasu felt it too, and even Ollie picked up on his owner's emotions. He barked out of concern.

"I don't like criminals." She closed the topic right then and there, since it ran far deeper than that, but Rebecca didn't want anyone to worry, especially when Irene had to travel around globally for an art exhibit. Worry is the _last_ thing that should be on her friend's mind. "There it is… the airport."

It was there indeed; the large building had a giant parking lot which had several spots in the front. The airport wasn't crowded at all, there weren't that many cars around the lot itself. She looked around for a parking space, noticing a very familiar tech-savvy car to her right. She didn't park near it though, for Rebecca wanted to keep this tidbit a surprise, so she found a closer spot to the grand entrance. She smiled, reaching down her car's compartment to get Ollie's new green harness. "You guys can get out now. Zamasu, you leave your suitcase here and I'll come by to help Irene with hers. Ollie, baby, come here, you need to put on your harness." The other two adults exited the car, while Ollie compiled happily seeing his harness in Rebecca's hands.

Zamasu stood up and once again smoothed out his shirt, even completely forgetting that he was wearing something other than his gi until he felt the breeze against his arms and legs. Irene came around the other way, smirking at the Kaioshin. "You know, you don't have to do all of that."

"This isn't my gi. What do you expect?" He raised his forearms towards her. Looking around the area, he couldn't help but close his eyes and feel the calm wind against his face, it made his hair sway and ghost around his cheeks along with his Potara earrings-

"Are you gonna help me with my luggage, _model boy_?"

And then, once again, Irene had to ruin _everything_. "I'm not helping you."

Irene pouted. "Please? I can't get all of this myself."

He sighed, and approached the trunk of Rebecca's car. While Irene was struggling to get one of the suitcases out of the trunk with both hands, Zamasu easily picked one up with one hand, and placed it on the ground. He then shook his head at her struggling, and proceeded to take the other suitcase and one hand, placing it on the floor. "Humans are weak..."

She turned to him. "Well excuse me, _mister god_."

He ignored the name. "And to think you had enough strength to ki blast me."

Irene closed the trunk, and then placed her hands on her hips. "Just goes to show that I'm not as weak as you think."

He crossed his arms. "You couldn't even lift that suitcase out of the car."

"And? _Ki_ is energy, it ain't physical."

"Are you really debating on how strong you are to _me_? A Kaioshin, for that matter?"

She smirked. "I don't need to debate."

"Excuse you?"

"Mm-hmm." Her teasing attitude came back. "You wouldn't know nothing about my abilities."

"I would know all about them, because you have nothing that's special in the first place."

She raised her fist. "Do you want another demonstration?"

He narrowed his eyes. "Is that your way of 'challenging' me to a fight?"

"It might be."

" _I don't think so_."

"Are you two done?"

Zamasu and Irene didn't realize that they were getting into one another's face every time they spoke. They turned to see Rebecca already out of her car with Ollie, who barked impatiently while strutting himself towards the airport on his leash. The Kaioshin immediately pulled away, giving Rebecca a cross look when she smirked. "What?"

Zamasu was the first to speak. "Don't look at me like that." He then started to walk off and into the airport. The two women looked at each other and followed suit.

The first thing Zamasu noticed was that this airport was _spacey_ , it's walls were basically large windows that allowed people to see the airplanes as they took off. The color scheme itself was very modern, there were potted plants in some places, especially in the lounging area which had some really comfortable chairs… with a few very _familiar_ people sitting on them, chatting away to one another. He made eye contact with the biracial male he met nearly two months ago.

" _Woah hold'_ , is that Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin looked at the group fully; there sat Adrian with two women he didn't know and… _James_. The basketball player was the only one who didn't get up to greet him but he didn't care, and the second he saw Irene he got up and nearly brushed against the Kaioshin briskly.

"'Rene!" James gave Irene the warmest hug with a kiss to her lips.

Irene was still shook on how her friends, all of them, came by to spend time with her at the airport. "I didn't know you all would be here!"

" _I did_."

Irene looked at her best friend, and she went over to playfully punch her shoulder. "I shoulda known you'd orchestrate this-" Unknown to the afro haired woman, another male exited the bathroom and came up behind Irene, covering her eyes while leaning to her side. "Uhh, James?"

"James' hands aren't as pretty as mine, honey."

She spinned around. "Jay!" Irene gave him a tight bear hug, which Jay did wince in her lovingly tight grip.

"Okay- uhh fam, 's a little hard to breath here." She released him and he stretched his arms out before hooking his arm around her neck teasingly.

"My bad, I just haven't seen you and Adri in a while." She chuckled.

"What was that about my hands?" James looked to the Asian male, who still had Irene under his arm.

"Your hands look like shit." He gave James the biggest asshole grin that anyone could muster after giving such a straightforward critique. Adrian snorted.

"Well, you try having a career dunking and dribbling through dudes your height and then see if your little pedicure would survive that shit." The basketball player crossed his arms and smirked.

"That's _kiiiiinda_ why I'm a music producer." The Asian male raised and wagged his finger in the air. "And you look fresh as hell in that outfit, Zamasu. I didn't think you'd be fashion-savvy."

Irene looked at Jay. " _That entire thing_ was my idea." The Kaioshin gave her a look and she stuck her tongue out at him.

One of the brown haired women that Zamasu did not recognize looked at him with wide eyes. She had brown eyes and like brown hair, and was a few inches shorter than him, perhaps taller than Irene. "So you're the man Adrian told me about." She held out her hand to shake. Zamasu looked at her face, and could see that this woman had a very playful nature about her, just like Irene did. "Nice to meet ya. I'm Ashley, that one over there is my boyfriend." She pointed at Adrian with her thumb while keeping her gaze on him.

He looked down and then shook her hand, and Adrian crossed his arms and cocked a brow up. "I have a _name_ , you know."

"Didn't feel like saying it, sweetie." She turned around and spoke in a mock lovey-dovey tone towards the curly haired male, who just narrowed his eyes in response.

"Same here." The other unknown woman approached him. This one had predominant dark brown hair with lighter highlights on the bottom of her breast length hair, and her eyes were a vibrant brown that contrasted greatly with her makeup and eyebrows. Despite her very confident appearance and catlike walk, she still held a very humble vibe around her. "Hey, my name's Lexi. Pleasure to meet you as well." The Kaioshin picked up another thing that happened to be prominent in her: coyness. This Lexi woman exhibited a coy, attractive and highly feminine nature, as if her walk and body language alone wasn't enough to indicate such, but it was projected in a way that made her sensuous.

"Damn, my guy is staring extra hard at your girl, Jay." James was to Zamasu's side. He had his hands on his hips, standing in a way that made his chest salient,

and the Kaioshin gave him a untoward look.

"I don't mind it." Lexi chuckled, and both males looked back at her and she giggled, joking waving her hand. "I'm just fucking with the both of you. Jay wouldn't mind it either."

Said Asian male hooked his arm against her shoulder. "I deadass wouldn't. You're already taken and uhh…" Jay blinked at Zamasu, "I highly doubt you even like human women."

"You'd be correct on that." Zamasu nodded.

"Can't a girl like Lexi be an exception?" The Kaioshin intuitively knew that James was still a little peeved off at his presence and wanted to make things a little harder for _himself_ in the process. So he looked at James and crossed his arms.

"No one is." And then he placed his attention on Rebecca and Ollie, namely the pug, whom Rebecca was talking to.

Irene went in between the two males. "You really Zamasu could even try to like someone? He's reading books constantly, he has no time for that." She wasn't _wrong_ , but at the same time Zamasu could pinpoint the undertone of her timbre. Even Jay, the _master of façades_ , had caught whiff of it too, but Irene called the entire group's attention. "I have to settle some things for the flight but in the meantime, you guys wanna grab something to eat?"

Adrian lidded his eyes. "You know I came here on an empty stomach, right?"

"We all did." Lexi, Jay and Ashley joined Adrian's statement.

"That shouldn't be _questioned_ , girl." Rebecca had her hands on her hips.

"Oh, you all know what I meant. Come along then, we'll probably stop by an array of places too."

As they traversed the airport, Zamasu quickly began to notice how they would get stopped every once in awhile because people would recognize one, two, or all of the six famous people within the eight-people-plus-Ollie group. Upon those ordeals, there was another predicament that made the Kaioshin very uncomfortable; he kept getting stared at, which is reasonable because no human being on this planet had green skin and he wasn't even human to being with. What made this entirely different was the way they staring, and sometimes what they were staring at. This would mostly be women that gave him complimentative looks, gazing at his slender built arms and torso as he walked by. At one point, they passed by three women and one of them looked at him while exclaiming "Damn!", pulling her glasses down from her eye-level to… see better? He seriously didn't know, her reaction was exaggerated to him. There were several moments where Irene would look back at him from James' shoulder with a smirk on her face, and those times are where the Kaioshin wanted to dropkick her straight into the foundation of the entire building.

The first spot they've entered was this very lavish restaurant that did serve a variety of breakfast entrees, and was always the earliest spot to open. The restaurant itself was huge, meant to cater mostly large groups of people concurrently, though there were some smaller tables in the area. The premise had a predominantly burnished modern-esque vibe, with deep mahogany walls and an onyx black floor. The tables were polished mahogany with cushioned, warm ivory colored seats. There were tiny chandeliers hung above each table, glistening white with glistening jewels that danged on the light source's corners. The entire aesthetic of the restaurant was soothing, and easy to the eye. The Kaioshin caught sight of some of the workers looking at him, particularly a light brunette-haired woman who had her fingers against her bottom lip, but he ignored it nonetheless. The group situated themselves on the table meant to serve ten people; Jay sat with Lexi, right across from Ashley and Adrian, who sat next to Irene and James. Right across from the artist and her boyfriend and sitting next to Lexi was Zamasu, and Rebecca sat on the other side of Jay, with Ollie having his own seat with his owner at the end of the table. Most food services, if needed, did cater to pets, and since Ollie was a bit too short to sit on the regular chairs, they pulled up a special chair designated for smaller dogs like him. Soon after, the brunette haired waitress came over with large, embossed menus in her arms.

She greeted them all with a warm smile. "Good morning to all of you today." She better positioned the menus, glancing at the Kaioshin sitting right in front of her. "My name is Gina and I will be serving you, here all of your menus." She handed four of them to Irene for her to pass down, and manually gave Lexi three of them to do the same. Gina manually handed the last menu to Zamasu, moving closer to the Kaioshin. "And here's _yours_."

If Zamasu wasn't as painfully naive as he is when it came to advances, then this situation would have gone smoother. He further noticed how she was getting closer to him, and was _only_ downright confused as to why Gina handed him the menu personally, not even paying attention to the way she was looking at him. "...Thank you." His voice was borderline-questioning, and he looked down at the menu.

Gina frowned, but then continued her job according. "So you all read through what you want, and I'll come back in a few minutes to take your orders." She held up her thumbs in reassurance, and then left the squad to choose what they wanted.

Irene shook her head, amazed as what just took place in front of her. "Are you really _this_ bad, Z?"

He looked up from opening the booklet. "What?"

"That woman was straight up _flirting_ with you, and you curved her so badly." Adrian snickered.

The Kaioshin had a deep frown on his face. "...Why?"

Rebecca leaned forward in her seat on the other end of the table. "Have you not taken a look in the mirror before you left home? Me and Irene told you that you look really good in that outfit."

He was still confused. "It shouldn't matter that much, shouldn't it?"

Everyone collectively sighed.

"I didn't think you'd be the clueless chick magnet at all, Zamasu. That's your name, right?" Lexi looked at him with a smile and Zamasu turned to her and he literally had to move his face back from hers, not because she was too close to him, but because she was _too close_ to him. She was smiling at him with a questioning glint in her eyes, the woman looked _way too pretty_ at such a close proximity. James quietly smirked.

He almost didn't answer her question, and inwardly questioned his fundamental sanity once again. "Yes, that is my name." He raised a brow. "And what do you mean by that?"

Ashley raised her hand to the other females, who were all about to collectively answer the Kaioshin's innocent question. "I got this. Basically what that is," she shifted to face him fully, and Zamasu looked at her. "You walk around and you attract all these girls toward you, but you're not even aware of it."

"Hence why a lot of these women were staring at you as we walked through the airport." Jay said.

Zamasu shook his head. Humans are weird, indeed. "Well, that's… something." He honestly didn't know what to say to that, so he cut the whole conversation right there and looked into the menu book. There were far too many unknown things on this elegant booklet in front of him and he couldn't make a decision because _heck_ , he had never heard of anything on this menu. Everyone else was chatting away, laughing and making their decisions, while Zamasu sat all confused and-

"You need help?"

The soft, smoky voice that belonged to the brown haired woman right next to him hit his acute ears, and he blinked. "No, why?"

She laughed shortly, her laugh sounded full and warm. "You're looking at the menu as if it's in an alien language or something. Look," she moved a little closer to see what he was looking at, and the Kaioshin repressed the strange urge to move away. "Show me what you want."

"Umm…" Suddenly, the pliant, extremely alluring scent of violets hit his nose, so much so that he nearly lost his train of thought because of how abrupt it was. "..What do they put in this restaurant? It smells _divine_."

"What do you mean? This place smells pretty normal to me." Lexi furrowed her brows.

Zamasu really thought such a scent was being emitting all throughout the restaurant, but when he turned to Lexi the scent only got stronger and like a genius, he had realized that this same heavenly scent was coming from _her_. "Oh, it's… it's just you." Great, that's just _brilliant_ , is that something you say to someone after you figure out that they smell amazing? He had read about perfumes and things of that nature and he was curious as to what she used. "What kind of perfume did you use?"

"Ohh, I woke up pretty early, I didn't put on any perfume to be real with you." She chuckled. "I just kinda woke up, took a shower, changed and left."

" _Oh." That makes it even worse_ , Zamasu internally groaned. She means to tell him that she smells like this naturally? How could a mere human being cultivate such a scent? It was nearly intoxicati- okay, maybe that was the wrong choice of words. Anything that's intoxicating would impair his sense of judgement, would it?

Then by that logic, damn near everything was intoxicating. He had been feeling like his mindset was slowly falling apart with every single day that had passed, and it only getting worse if he continued to allow himself into all of these events, and sit next to a human woman that was unearthing unusual reactions from him-

"Zamasu?" She waved her hand in front of him and he blinked. "You alright? Do you know what you want?"

He snapped back and regained his composure. "Right, I don't really know any of these things on the menu." The only thing he could rely on was the pictures, and even that wasn't helping.

"You know what, I got something good for ya. How about a…" her finger dragged gently along the menu as she picked out her suggestion for him. Her nails were painted in a matte maroon color, _her hand looks nice_. "Mocha latte, and… _ooh_ , an apple strudel with cream? Oh gosh, you'd definitely love that." She was smiling down at the menu, _she has a nice smile too_ -

Where was he getting these thoughts from? He should focus on what she chose for him rather than any of _that_. He knew what an apple was, and even though he particularly wasn't savvy with fruits, Shinjin were mainly omnivorous. Anything with fruits in it wouldn't hurt him at all.

Gina came back with her notepad, she situated herself next to Zamasu once again and took down everyone's order. When it came down to him, Gina made eye contact with him and her smile got bigger. What was seen as seductive to everyone else was nearly creepy to the Kaioshin. "And what are you getting?"

"I'll have..." he looked down at the menu like he was totally reading his suggestion off the booklet. "An apple strudel with a mocha latte."

"Oh, that's one of our best, sweetheart. No problem, and what design would you like for your latte?"

"A… design?" He raised one brow.

"Yup, we serve our mocha lattes with a custom design, unless you don't want one of course."

He shrugged. "I don't know, a violet maybe?"

"Alrighty, that's _lovely_." She winked. "All of your orders will take some time since it is pretty large, but sit back and your food will come in no time."

It was after Gina left when Zamasu realized his unconscious, _stupidly idiotic_ decision. Why was a violet the first thing on his mind, just because Lexi smelled like one? No, it had nothing to do with that, it just happened to be on his mind at that time and it just so happened to correlate with the woman's scent. Besides, why not choose that? Violet's are nice, they smell nice, they look nice, they just are nice, _and so is sh-_

It's as if his own mind was attacking him with subconscious thoughts that he would never, in his _right_ mind, conjure up in his head. He needed to focus on something else, like… maybe the pug sitting on the other end of the table. Ollie was looking at Rebecca and she was talking to him, he looked elated at the food that she had picked out for him (since they did have a special section for dogs) with that silly smile on his face.

No one else seemed to notice the exchange between Zamasu and Lexi other than Jay and James. Jay had no problem with what was going on, it was James who was trying really hard to hide a scheming smile that threatened to grace his lips. Jay noticed this, and instantly caught the correlation behind that shitty smirk. "Why are you smirking?"

The Asian male brought James' expression to the forefront, catching the attention of Lexi, Irene, and Zamasu. The basketball player frowned, playing it off. "I wasn't smirking."

Jay raised a brow, allowing the pause between them to grow until James' brow twitched uncomfortably. The Kaioshin narrowed his eyes, while Jay just nodded. "Aight… my bad. I coulda sworn I saw a little smile, but it was probably just nothing behind that at all." And then he looked at Lexi. "You didn't tell me what you were getting, hun."

"Well, I just got this, this, and this… and also a bloody mary." She pointed at each of her choices and looked at her boyfriend, who had a funny look on his face. "What?"

He blinked. "You tell me that I eat too much, and yet you ordered two of the biggest meals on there."

"I never said I _didn't_ eat a lot." Lexi tapped his nose, and he kissed his teeth with a smile on his face.

Zamasu took this time to fully observe the people he was with. In front of him were Irene and James, the both of them were talking about stuff he didn't care about. Next to the pair was Adrian and Ashley and it seemed like the two could be dubbed the 'Humor Couple', because everything that has came out of their mouths was humorous to a range of degrees. Next was the two that were right next to him, Jay and Lexi. They honestly were a perfect match because of their strong sense of masculinity and femininity, which the two of them procure as a part of their personalities. While Jay was dominant and forthright on his own, Lexi showed the same traits, yet she gave off a mellow and confident vibe. Even though she was outstandingly beautiful, she still didn't feel the need to show off how beautiful she was because she just is, and that could be the most attractive thing to find in any female.

The last person in the group was Rebecca, who sat on the other side of where he was with Ollie adjacent to her seat. She had switched multiple times from either being on her phone, and talking to Ollie like a mother would when she bonds with her child. The red haired woman at best was not uncomfortable in where she was sitting, although she would glance to the right, at Jay, every once in awhile.

Rebecca, in all of her honesty, was still shook on what Jay had told her over the phone. How he psychoanalyzed her with ease, despite not even trying to meaninglessly converse with him, and he would waste no time in telling her what he knew and what he wanted to say. The funny thing about it is that Lexi was one of her closest friends, and she had told Rebecca the same thing that Jay primarily stated; that he didn't hate her at all. The two had a close bond, and Rebecca figured that he didn't mention the predicament with his ex to Lexi. A hollow pit started to form in her stomach again, and she looked down at the table, drumming her fingers softly against the polished wood. It didn't make it any better with Adrian sitting right across from her with his own girlfriend, doing a great job in communicating with one another and not with her. Her mind went to the things James said, and flashed through the past; she really couldn't blame the music producer, at all.

After a good thirty minutes, everyone's food came by. There were a bunch of waiters and waitresses carrying the large quantities of breakfast meals. The first few had to go around the table because they got Rebecca, Adrian, Ashley, and Ollie's food on their trays first. The next batch of waiters carried Irene, James, and Jay's food, Lexi and Zamasu's food being the last with Lexi literally having an _entire tray to herself_.

"Are you seriously gonna eat all that?" Ashley pointed in amazement.

Lexi gave her girl-friend a look. "If I ordered it, I could damn near finish it."

"Jay, you got a woman with a superhuman metabolism rate." Adrian smirked, and Jay gave him that 'You-already-know-bro' look.

Zamasu looked down at his apple strudel and like every single delicacy he's tried so far, it smelled warm and soft. The mocha latte looked weird to him because… this wasn't tea, yet it was in a _teacup_ , which was strange. The cup itself even looked a bit larger and rounder than a regular sized teacup, but then again, this was what Lexi recommended to him, and it was already getting to his senses.

Not like his senses _haven't_ been meddled with in the past hour, anyways.

"You got a mocha latte? Well shit." Irene smiled. "He's in for a toasty trip with the food he ordered."

"It was all me, thank me later." When she said that last part, her finger slightly made contact with his arm, like the part that wasn't under his shirt sleeve, and he turned his head quickly. Lexi looked down at the cup and smiled. "Wooow, you got a violet on yours!"

"It looks pretty damn sick." Jay nodded, impressed.

"Yeah, true. It smells great too." Adrian chimed in.

Jay looked at his best buddy. "You can smell that from there?"

"Yes, it's amazing."

"You know what's funny?" Lexi smiled down at the cup. "That flower is the scent of the same body wash I used this morning. That is such a coincidence."

Zamasu's right fist clenched, not because he was angry or anything, but because _that wasn't no damn coincidence_. And he was the only one who knew that he somewhat chose violet of all the possible, inconspicuous flowers there are known to him, accidentally on purpose. He took hold of the silver fork, and was about to poke it through the strudel, when Lexi interrupted his process of forgetting what she had said.

"Wait! Wait for the cream, it's coming soon." She held out a hand, and he kept the fork in his hand. In less than a minute, they brought out the white vanilla cream served onto a ceramic platter with a small spoon for him to place it on top of the strudel. He didn't know one would have to do that, so Lexi took the small spoon and topped the strudel off for him.

"Try it. You're gonna love it."

He looked down at the little pasty, grabbing a fork to cut a small piece of it off with the cream as well. It had such a light, flaky consistency yet the apples made the strudel smell so much better than it looked. It already _looked_ downright delicious. He raised the fork to his mouth and took it all, only chewing once before stopping abruptly and...staring at the ground somewhere. Then he started chewing again and the gratified expression on his face grew more and more.

"... _What_..." He literally had to voice his disbelief, his utter amazement, at how such food can even _exist_ in this world, this was making his face stir in delight. He heard a giggle from the women that were closest to him. "By _Kami…_ "

"He definitely likes it." Ashley snorted and Adrian nudged her side, making her laugh.

"Girl, who wouldn't? Those things are a fucking _treasure_." Irene looked at Zamasu. "You know, I could always buy you another one, since you're sitting here about to n-"

" _Do not ruin this moment, Irene_." He raised a finger in front of her with a scowl on his face.

"This is… actually the first time I heard him say your name." Rebecca looked between the two. Even Irene was surprised.

Zamasu looked at the biracial woman in front of him. "Let me eat in _peace_." He took another delicate slice of the strudel, closing his eyes as he chewed. He looked down at the latte to his left, holding the mug in both hands, taking a tiny sip and nearly _moaning_ at the taste of it. If he had green tea and _this_ every single day, he'd probably be the most satisfied man in _both_ realms.

Ollie, on the other hand, had his paws against the dog chair as he happily munched on his pumpkin cinnamon dog waffles. Rebecca watched as her canine son ate his waffles. "You think Loki would love this, Ollie?"

He tilted his head and ruffed. He pushed a portion of it away from him, since this right-hand best buddy was still at home and he wanted him to have this as well.

"No, you don't need to do that. I can just buy another for him." She petted his head, ruffling the thin fur coat between his black ears.

After they all finished, they said their thanks and left the store, although a few other waiters and waitresses held them back because the group was comprised of very famous people for the sake of props and autographs, whereas Zamasu unintentionally made a circle of his own with Gina and other female waitresses asking him questions.

" _Soooo…_ where are you from?" A blue-eyed waitresses gave him a highly flirtatious look. Matter of fact, all of them were, and it almost looked like they lowkey competing with one another.

He have to make this response a reasonable lie, because he didn't want to explain his origins in the middle of a restaurant, with more than five women gawking at him right now. "A different planet."

"Wow, that's so cool!"

"Do all the people in your planet look as good as you?"

"Uhh…" Most men would probably be a little bit stoked if they had five pairs of cleavage in such a close proximity, but Zamasu was confused. Do they not know anything about personal space? "I suppose."

Why did they swoon? "You even _sound_ super hot."

"I heard you liked the food, too."

"You should come again some time."

He would do that if it meant eating a bunch of apple strudels and drinking mocha lattes and not being stared at like a umm… he didn't know of any analogy to represent this situation at all.

"Okay, ladies," James came over to break apart the small circle. "We're gonna need this green guy to come with us." He looked at Zamasu. "We gotta go, now."

It's as if he thought that Zamasu would want to stay here in the first place. As they exited the waitresses both said 'Bye', one or two of them giving Zamasu _bed eyes_ and winking at him. If only he knew what those stares _entailed_ , he wouldn't have frowned at them as if they had eight heads. The group decided to sit back in another much larger lounging room; there were more people in the airport as of now, so Irene went to fix up whatever requisitions she needed, as well as talk with her guards (the same people who took her paintings two days before she left). Zamasu was left with the rest of the group, showing each other different things on their phone, and talking about events that happened in their career. He would observe the entire scope of the large building, watching as people came and go, boarding their flights or returning from one concurrently. There was a lot of security and cops around which at first the Kaioshin assumed that it was only because of the surge in black vans, but judging from the amount of exclaims he heard from other people, pertaining to one or more people within this group, the presence of security was for the sake of their own safety. Somehow, he found this peculiar, as they only paid attention to those fans that were being a little too relentless towards those they admired, particularly the ones that liked James, and not towards anything else that could impeach on behalf of their well being. It made sense too, a lot of girls and women were fawning over the basketball player, in contrast with those who were fans of only Jay and Adrian; those people were rather laid-back and approached the males with self control. Lexi and Ashley were also one of those people who had well maintained fans, some of which talking to Ashley about books, and asking Lexi for makeup tips and advice; she happily gave her two cents on behalf of it, and now that Zamasu looked at it, her makeup was rather eloquent, and it suited her vibrant milk-chocolate eyes and golden tan skin beautifully. He still doesn't understand why he reacts in a certain way when Lexi even looks at him. And unlike the waitresses, she doesn't even try to appeal to his eye, she just does, and this is something that the Kaioshin refrained from admitting, which furthered his confusion, which made him internally frustrated, and caused him to look back at the lady once more to see her speaking and making gestures to her face with another middle-aged woman.

He averted his eyes away from her, and shook his head.

A rather built-looking male came up to Lexi a couple dozen seconds after the older woman left. The brown haired woman looked up to see a guy approaching kindly in a purple hoodie and white under armor with blue jeans. He looked down at her, his eyes flickered towards her bag but she couldn't really see that due to the hoodie's obstructive look, and without warning, he snatched her bag and ran off without a word. The security guards were still trying to tame the amount of girls on their end, so they couldn't even get the man before he even attempted to steal from her. Everyone in the group exclaimed, Ollie even barked, and Jay instantly got up but Lexi told him and everyone else to sit back down and she ran after him, pissed.

"Get the fuck back here, asshole!" Almost everyone within the group, including Zamasu, watched as she easily closed the distance between her and the robber within a _few seconds_. He honestly did not expect her to be _that_ fast. When they were both relatively far away, the thief turned to the right and continued running, pushing a divider in front of her path. Her naturally quick reflexes came about, and she placed both hands on the divider and jumped over it with ease.

"Is your girl a fucking trackstar?" James's eyes were wide as hell, and Jay just smiled proudly.

"It's even more insane because she's wearing _heels_." Ashley looked at her female friend in astonishment.

"She'll serve him up in no time."

And Jay was right, because both individuals disappeared far ahead of everyone's view, and it took them half a minute to finally reappear again. The thief took another right turn since there was no other way he could run without getting caught, and ran behind where everyone else sat. He lost his breath, and stopped to look behind him, seeing Lexi run all full speed with her shoulders pointed towards him. He yelled as he stepped back, only to get body slammed and tackled to the ground by the same woman whom he stole from. The girls and the guys, and even the crowd that soon formed cheered collectively, as justice was served once again.

Lexi got up just in time for the man to still be on the ground, and place her heeled foot on his chest to keep him down, and used the same foot to kick his hand with her purse open. She took hold of it, stopping to make sure that nothing actually fell out, and she turned to the guards and called them over to wheel this poor man out of their sight. The woman returned back to the group who were now giving her huge props for stopping a thief.

"How the heck do you run so fast in heels?" Adrian was incredulous, but Lexi just giggled.

"A lot of free time, dude. A lot of it."

"You know, I thought I had to get up and beat his ass for a second, but that wasn't the case." Jay kissed his girlfriend on the cheek. "Your feet don't hurt, don't they?"

"Not really, these heels aren't even that tall, they're only two-ish inches."

"Two inches is a lot to be running off of!" Rebecca placed Ollie back down on the floor. "And you're not even out of breath!"

"Jay, what have you been feeding your girlfriend?" Ashley narrowed her eyes at him.

He raised both hands. "You might as well ask her."

The group shared a lighthearted moment after Lexi had caught the thief, all but one person had something to say about the whole ordeal, mainly because he had a million things running through his mind right now. The Kaioshin did nothing but watched, amazed at the amount of stamina and agility this beauti- _woman_ had, it was unbelieveable. His quiet demeanor greatly contrasted with his thoughts, many of them running amok and contradicting and conflicting with one another. The unfamiliarity, the fact that he was wearing this type of clothing, all the staring he had to deal with coupled with the fact that he sat next to a woman that vaguely brought about unearthed realizations within him, was too much for him to handle. Everything that he been fighting and placing mental barriers against ever since he met her, ever since he _saw_ her, was slowly starting to crumble.

 _And he did not like it, not one bit._

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **If y'all have watched Inglorious Basterds, I think you would tell where I got the apple strudel inspiration from, the foodgasms are** _ **real**_ **in this one :). Since there is so much going on in this particular part of the story, this chapter is actually going to be split into two big ones instead of three smaller ones, ya know, for the sake of y'all's entertainment xD.**

 **That being said, I hope you guys actually do** _ **read**_ **this story and really understand what's going on, especially within this chapter. If you've noticed after the 'art-pickup' guys had left, Zamasu started talking about how the Earth looked amazing, implying that the humans within it were a skin infection, and right after that he sighed and went to make himself a cup of tea. Or when he almost went on about how humans are dirty and don't know how to be organized and started** _ **laughing…**_ **just think about that for a second. Or a minute, because it may be some development that you're seeing-AHEM.**


	14. Peace At Last

**REALLY, REALLY IMPORTANT ASS NOTE**

 **First of all, I uploaded this much earlier than anticipated to be quiet honest, but that's mainly because today is the LAST DAY OF SCHOOL for me, and I got hype and wrote a lot. Yup, that's what happened. Now, onto another thing I've been seeing...**

 **I'm gonna address something that has been kind of perplexing in the last chapter, and I was well aware of the way it was written, and how it would perplex others before I published it. I'll straighten this out and ought to explain what the** _ **blue turtle shell fuck**_ **happened in the last chapter.**

 **No, Zamasu has not found a love interest. No, Zamasu is not falling in love with anyone and** _ **no**_ **…** _ **he is not falling in love with Lexi. Allow me to explain**_ _ **.**_

 **His whole thing is basically regarding just her looks and nothing more, or nothing less. He feels no sexual or romantic attraction towards her whatsoever, rather it's just him meeting a human that conflicts with the way he perceives other human beings. He thinks all humans are ugly, both inside and out, and it just so happens that Lexi's appearance challenges that same perception. You may know that some people have gorgeous faces and bodies, but he doesn't know that; so his bashful [yet sappy AF] aversion was based on the one thing that he's been battling against for a really long time; unfamiliarity.**

 **You could say she challenges** _ **his**_ **'status-quo', per say, and he's inwardly arguing with how he could like this woman's looks even though she's human. He isn't romantically or sexually attracted to her and** _ **could not be**_ **, because he does not know her that well at the moment. And besides, he _overreacts_** _ **and** **over-exaggerates all the damn time**_ **over the littlest things; in y'alls defense I can understand that. But I thought I'd just write that here, before this gets vertical.**

 **Though without further a do, this is the second part of Chapter 13!**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Peace At Last [Pt.2]**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Irene returned a few minutes after the ordeal, and Rebecca gave her the deets on behalf of the thievery. She laughed on behalf of the idiot man who tried Lexi so brashly. Right now, they were all going to some sort of souvenir shop located in the southern part in the second floor of the airport.

"You tackled him down?"

Lexi gave her a look. "'Rene, how else was I supposed to stop him?"

"This wasn't some frail dude, either. The guy was like six feet and he had some muscle on him too and she just took him down." Ashley said. For the sake of scaling, Lexi was an inch shorter than Jay, who was 5'9. She didn't weigh much either, as her body was a slim-thick build yet toned build. She had on a simple V-neck and black curvy-fit jeans, and we all know how hard it is to run in a pair of jeans yet Lexi could do it easily.

"I still wanna know how you managed to catch up to him with those heels on." Irene pointed down to her golden peep-toed heels.

"I just run on my toes like almost always. It's easier." She shrugged.

"You're a toe runner and you think that's _easy_?" James looked at her. "Bro, no wonder… your legs are fit as fuck."

She giggled. "Well, thank you, but running isn't the only thing that's made my legs look like these. It's through highschool and thanks to this man right here." She ruffled Jay's samurai bun, and he recoiled.

"Don't mess this up!"

Lexi raised a brow. "It's already messed up, though."

He held his head. "That's the point. I spent like fifteen minutes doing this."

"Fifteen minutes to finesse a messy bun?" She crossed her arms.

"Are we just gonna move on from the fact that she said Jay is the reason why her legs look so good?" Adrian raised a hand above his waist level.

The couple gave him a confused look, and then Jay, realizing what his friend meant, reached out to give him a Hardy. "Leave it to you to take it that way, and that's usually James' job. She meant stunt-wise."

Lexi clarified her boyfriend's response. "A.k.a through martial arts and stuff."

At the term _martial arts_ , Zamasu's attention instantly went to the major conversation, and Irene noticed this. She decided to craftly amp up the talk. "And you're really good at it."

Lexi became super humble. "I mean, I'm pretty good at it, but I'm not really all that."

Adrian crossed his arms. "That's bullshit, you whooped James' ass once in a sparring session! Don't you all remember that?"

Irene nodded. "I remember that, _oh my gosh_. She was wiping the floor with him, and he's more than half a foot taller than her!"

The basketball player looked between everyone with a sad face. "You guys, my girlfriend, you all are seriously talking about how my ass was whooped by Lexi and I'm standing right here. I feel attacked right now."

The Asian male snorted. "Well, not as attacked as you felt when she smacked you down."

As _petty_ as it definitely sounds, hearing that Lexi actually beat James sounded satisfying to the Kaioshin. A ghost of a smile formed on his lips and he looked down, it kept getting bigger until it became a smirk.

"Listen, you said you wanted me to go at full force." Lexi looked at James, and he semi-flailed his arms.

"Well, I didn't know you knew all those different types of shits that time!"

" _Martial art styles_." Jay corrected the basketball player, for the art itself was a core component to the Japanese man's life. "She learned most of those styles you saw before dating me, I just _sharpened_ her skills over time."

"You didn't sharpen shit." She flicked his head. "I knew all the techniques well before we dated."

"Really? You wanna bet?"

"Ya know what, after we leave the airport and we go home, I might just give you a demonstration."

Rebecca looked at Zamasu. "This is basically the cusp of their relationship, Zamasu. Expect to see this like 99 percent of the time."

"More like 70; the rest is for kisses, food and cuddling." Adrian evaded the arm slap that Jay would've given him.

The Kaioshin was learning so much right now. Completely ignore the fact that he was still getting stared at, but he found out that this woman he just met was also good at fighting. So much so that she took down James, who was particularly big and pretty muscular on his own, even more than the Kaioshin. But obviously, ever since that predicament at Irene's house he predominantly knew that those muscles meant nothing compared to any martial artist, _period_. That was probably the only piece of information that he had acquired about her that didn't make him feel conflicted, although she was very pretty and… had a nice voice… and recommended him some heavenly food earlier…

This was _not_ helping his case.

"Isn't that us?" Ashley looked up at her man. "Wait no, 70 percent of it is us making each other laugh."

"And staying up all night giggling at stupid shit like idiots." He held Ashley close. "That's all on her."

"Nuh-uh, that's _you_." She pointed and poked his nose. "You're the idiot for laughing at them."

"But I'm _your_ idiot." Adrian ruffled her hair, he wasn't wrong either.

"Me and Irene mostly just like kiss and get real touching close." He looked down at the attractive artist. "Although we can't do that as much _nowadays_ , that doesn't stop us from kissing." He attacked her forehead with his lips.

"'Ey- not in public, babe." She gently pushed his lips from her forehead. It seemed that she wasn't aware of the way he phrased his statement. Adrian actually caught it, as well as Jay and Rebecca, since they were the three who knew the ordeals behind Irene and Zamasu. The Kaioshin narrowed his eyes, but he dismissed it; such a thing would be a waste of time to address.

They had finally reach the souvenir shop, which was actually much bigger than one would think. It had two floors, both being the size of nearly half a football field, and it was filled with mostly artisan things, but there were articles of clothing, and certain seasonal paraphernalia. The group decided to split up and go into different sections of the store for the sake of time, and their desire to buy something off of here. The couples accordingly went separate with one another, and Zamasu and Rebecca along with Ollie. She asked Zamasu if he wanted anything and he obviously said no, so they'd venture out to get a thing for Ollie. They had a pet section on the bottom floor filled with toys, accessories or pet clothing. Rebecca and Zaamsu walked through aisle with the elated pug, and she make a cooing sound at the sight of some clothes that he couldn't see.

"This is _so_ cute! Lookit." What she held out to him was a dog hoodie, it was soft in texture and overall in the same color theme as a panda. Its colors were different though; Rebecca picked up one that was a pale lime green color, just a bit lighter than his own skin tone and resembled the color of Ollie's bed, and it had little black panda ears adorned on the hood itself. "Ollie, you like this? It would look so adorable on you!"

Like he would be towards anything that was positive, Ollie barked and kept going on his hind legs, stoked at the colors of the panda hoodie. "I'm definitely getting this for you, sweetie." Rebecca held the hoodie in her hands with a big smile on her face.

The Kaioshin almost always found her interactions with Ollie endearing, mainly because of the innocence of her dog and the warm heartedness of her as a person. He isn't reminded of how much he hated humans whenever Rebecca was with him even if she shared the same sentiment, it was ironic at best. Unlike _someone_ who he happened to live with…

"Are you sure you don't want anything?"

He looked at Rebecca. "What am I to keep? There is no reason to buy me anything."

"But like… I'd like for you to have something, at least."

She has a thing for being really kind. "I really do not want anything at all. You do not need to spend anything on me."

She sighed. " _Fine_." And walked past the Kaioshin, who was now confused.

"Why are you getting exasperated for?"

"I'm not, it's just… I like getting things for people I like." She smiled. "But it's fine if you don't want anything."

He found that trait of her very weird; it's not like she was incessant with such, but it was as if she was _obligated_ to getting him something. He could imagine the woman would spoil anyone who spent even a little bit of quality time with her. The Kaioshin could see that such a trait would make her an easy person to manipulate; anyone could switch up their words easily enough to make her do whatever they wanted, and because he was surrounded by humans, the Kaioshin could tell that happened more than it should. That brought up another thing he had noticed about her as they were in the other restaurant, and that is how lonely she seems to be. Even if Irene is her best friend, they were both adults who lived their own lives, they can't simply be next to each other all day. Everyone else was talking and laughing with one another and Rebecca mostly spent her time looking or talking to Ollie, reading things off of her phone, or just eating and staring off into space. Despite that, however, there seemed to be a lot going through her mind at the moment.

He could pinpoint a possible reason for this being correlative to what they have talked about in the car. The way she reacted towards the black van driving past her car made it evident that she had ran into one of those people at some point, and talking about her hospital being vandalized she refused to dwell on what was actually there. Rebecca must have been stressed about that, or it's something else that he didn't know about. Unfortunately, because Zamasu saw no significance in the fact that everyone in the group minus her were _couples_ , he would not have thought that lowkey singling out even mattered to her.

He would've, because that never crossed his mind in the first place.

And unfortunately, both of those reasons were correct. The red-haired woman tried her absolute best not to gaze at everyone else as they ate back in the restaurant, and even as they made their way into this store. It reminded her of how she was in highschool with Adrian; that happy, fleeting innocence one has when they first start dating, and even as they continue to date down the road. Sometimes a relationship leads to a marriage, and possibly leads to children, and Rebecca wondered what each of their kids would look like, minus Jay and Lexi because Jay himself did not want children. A fact, and more than one she already knew made themselves apparent, and walking through the light atmosphere of the souvenir shop no longer seemed to be positive at all. She almost felt like crying.

Every time she was reminded of this, it hit her in a very weak spot. She felt like the value of her dignity would dwindle with every second it'd pass, but now she had to swallow back what was in her mind. _There is no time for this_ , she had a temporary mansion-mate with her for an entire month, she can't cry here. Maybe at home in the shower or somewhere inconspicuous, because she didn't want to make a scene, nor did she want the Kaioshin to worry.

 _Could_ he worry, though? This was where her realizing they both hated humans had a dichotomy because he himself wasn't human. Sure, he was sentient, but would he care if she were sad? It could be considered insensitive on her part to think that he couldn't, but that was always something Rebecca would prematurely think. It's the same mindset that causes her to keep everything to herself until she solves those problems, and some of them are on-running for _years_. The 25 year-old medical prodigy could fix a brain tumor and heal a broken limb and cure a fatal disease, but she can't fix _everything…_ some things are just not meant to be _fixed_.

Ollie got up on his hind legs, patting her leg and barking trying to get her attention. Blinking out of her thoughts, Rebecca looked down at her dog and smiled. The ecstatic pug below her instantly sensed her dolor, and he kept on each hind leg to make her crouch down to him. She looked into those chocolate eyes, reminded of the innocence and the grit of the two dogs that she raised ever since they were young, and both of them are inspirations in their own right. The pug she was looking at right now was separated from his own family as a pup and grew up in a shelter. Because of the fact that his kind are indeed inbred, and people have come to fully realize how flawed their genetic defects were, a lot of pugs were either taken back to the shelter or completely neglected by both adoptees and those within the facility. All of this led to many pugs being killed or left to die because they had little to no chance of being rehomed, the inbred dogs themselves are even going extinct at this point; Rebecca could not imagine the amount of sorrow and trauma that went along with watching beings of your own species _die_ , especially your own family. She got to him before he was subjected to being put down, and now he is a mushy bun of happiness. In the past, he was a lot more down and anxious, yet he still stands strong and energetic.

She was more than grateful to have him in her life. Had he not existed in her reality, she wouldn't have valued all life the way she did now.

"Umm…"

The sound of the male Kaioshin's voice made her turn around, nonchalantly. "What?"

"Are you not done here?"

She could tell he just wanted to go home. Well _obviously_ , with a bunch of strangers staring and exclaiming at you along with women being extra pervasive in your presence, who wouldn't want to leave? It reminded her of the days when she and Irene used to get cat-called a lot, but that has declined greatly in the recent years.

"Yeah, we are. I think Irene's flight would leave in 20 minutes, so she would have 10 minutes to board it early, since it is first class."

He did that smoothing out thing with his shirt again, and Rebecca smirked. "I know you're eager to get out of here, we got at least ten minutes and then everyone is gonna depart and I'll drive us back to my place."

 _Ten minutes_ , the Kaioshin thought. It may not seem like a lot but ten minutes happens to be a good six hundred seconds, which happens to be six hundred thousands milliseconds, and that is a giant number. "Why can't you just leave early?"

Rebecca's mouth opened slightly. "Irene's my friend! I can't say bye to a bestie? You'll be _fine_ , trust me." She patted his shoulder and he actually looked down to where the contact was and back to her. "It's only ten minutes, how bad could it be?"

 **(•V•) (•V•) (•V•) (•V•) (•V•)**

It's been eight minutes.

They have left that souvenir shop and were now saying bye to each other. They spent fifteen seconds saying _bye_ to one another, _fifteen whole seconds_ just to say one single word.

Except they hugged Irene, and said a multitude of words and also started having a conversation in the midst of completing their task of simply saying 'Bye'. It is possible to overdo an objective, you know.

"Bye Zamasu!"

The artist came up to him expecting a handshake and a response, but he just looked at her hand, and then at her. "No."

She made a sour face. "Really now?"

He blinked. "Yes."

She sighed. "I don't have time for this." She muttered under her breath, but still smiled and waved at him. "Well, alrighty then. Bye, baby." Irene gave her boyfriend a final kiss on the lips, and left to board her plane. This of course left everybody to continue chatting amongst each other. The Kaioshin, even if he wanted to leave right now, expected Rebecca to hang around the group for a longer amount of time. The red haired woman only spoke with Lexi for a few minutes, and gave her a hug goodbye right before she turned and departed, without saying anything to the others. She thought she could slip away quick enough for none of them to notice, and they wouldn't have, had it not been for James.

"You're leaving, Rebecca?"

She turned around as Ollie started pulling his way in the opposite direction towards Zamasu, making her arm hang out along with him. "Yeah, I gotta take Ollie and Zamasu home." She held her out and waved at the group while back pedaling to Ollie's direction purposely acting as if he was pulling her backwards, even though he technically was. "Bye Bye, guys! I'll see you later." She tapped Zamasu's arm and walked past him while looking at Lexi. "I'll call you later!"

"No prob', hun!" Lexi waved at the both of them. "Bye Zamasu, it was nice meeting you!" After she said that, the others waved at the Kaioshin as well.

He regarded their goodbyes, purposely making them short and simple with a wave. Luckily for him it wasn't only Lexi saying goodbye so he had the advantage of looking at everybody's face instead of her for more than two seconds. Ollie was in front of the both of them, walking as directed by his owner. Rebecca opted for an elevator the allowed them to descend to the bottom floor; it was covered with glass and had a black platform. Ollie placed his paws against the railing as he looked around the scenery before them. For some odd reason, Zamasu felt like this woman was counting how much time it took her to leave the group, she looked far too calculative to just be walking around the airport quietly. Sometime while they were in the elevator the only thing she said was "I'm pretty sure it won't take long for us to reach the main lobby. Give it a good minute."

They were in the lobby within five minutes, Ollie every now and then stopping to pull Zamasu by biting the side of his pants towards a certain area and Rebecca allowing them both to stop and look around. She didn't engage in much talking, which was weird compared to the first time they actually spoke, but he could tell that something was bothering her. The Kaioshin could have asked what the ordeal was much earlier ago but he dismissed it at first, and as time passed it was getting more and more difficult to just ignore it. He could _feel_ the uneasiness oozing out of her. She was checking her phone, and allowed Zamasu to hold Ollie's leash, the pug stopped his haphazard trek and looked at his owner, and then at Zamasu, and tilted his head in confusion.

 _I know right._

He couldn't hold it in anymore. "Is there something wrong?"

The red haired woman looked up at him. "Hnn?"

He repeated himself, his tone of voice unchanged. "Is there something wrong."

"Ohh, umm…" she paused to glance at her phone candidly. "Nope, nothing at all. I'm just looking at something here."

He couldn't tell if she purposely looked down in order to realistically deny that something was indeed wrong, or if she really had to check her phone. "Very well, then." He started walking towards the spinning doors with Ollie's leash in hand. "We should leave."

"Right." She giggled and did this semi-skip to catch up to him and her dog. "My car is over… there." She was looking around until she finally pointed to her car and Zamasu's impending train of trough was cut off; he just now noticed that her car was a chrome red hue. Didn't she have a black car?

That was the least of his inquiries; the woman had an obvious habit of ditching whatever bothers her for the sake of not telling anyone. The way her demeanor switched us after he said that they were leaving was strange, how does someone keep themselves from confronting something that's made them abruptly _silent_? Either way, he opened his door and Ollie jumped in to sit in the back and he sat in right after. Rebecca then plopped into her seat, placing Ollie's new toys and such in the seat beside him, and revved her engines up.

She inhaled. "So… Irene's gone, you're gonna be spending a month with me and my babies."

 _What?_ She had _children_? Wait no, she meant her dogs. _Smart one_. "That's a bit better in comparison to her."

The only possible downside was that if he wanted to just be alone (which he always does), there would be no giant bookshelf for him to pick out of. Irene had two very large ones in her room, hundreds of books housed in each, and he already been through three quarters of both shelves within the past three months. It won't be long until he'll have to manually look for some form of entertainment when she comes back. But on a positive note, there was Ollie, and he was certain that even if Rebecca had books for him to read, Ollie wouldn't allow him to do so. There is nothing wrong with that because the pug managed to worm his way into an unopened part of Zamasu's heart in such a short amount of time, hence why he could literally make Zamasu accept whatever he wanted just by looking at him. Perhaps Rebecca herself was as introverted as him, maybe he wouldn't have to deal with her chatting with any of her friends over the phone. Irene does it often, and even though she wasn't loud on the phone at all, the Kaioshin just hated her. We've been through this _already_.

Another question came into mind. "This car… wasn't it black?"

What's really sad is the fact that Zamasu didn't know what this hovering moving thing was called until Rebecca said it earlier today, but she didn't have to know that. "This one has always been red. I have more than one car."

Why would _one_ human being need _two_ cars? "Why?"

She smiled at him as they went through an underpass. "Because I like this one and the black one."

"Then why not just make one of them both red and black?"

She giggled, finding his simplistic inquiry rather cute. "Zamasu, it just doesn't _work that way._ " She flicked his arm.

He blinked at where she touched him, and looked back at her. "You just have this notion for touching me, don't you?"

A smirk. " _Mayyyyyybe_."

The Kaioshin shook his head. "Is there a reason for it?"

 _I love how he reads so much into the littlest things_. "No, not at all."

"Then why do it?"

"Because why not."

She had a jaunty smile on her face and she sat straighter in her seat. It reminded him of the way Ollie was whenever something piqued his interest. "You're really silly." He then looked back at Ollie to see him quietly sitting back on his toy supposedly broken toy puzzle. His paw hit one button and the toy popped up and he sat up straight as his eyes got adorably big. Yup, they were too alike.

A laugh escaped her lips. "I take great pride in it. What makes you say that?"

"What kind of person blithely flicks another's arm?"

Rebecca shrugged. "I dunno, a person like me? There are a lot of people like me, though. I promise I won't flick your arm next time."

The Kaioshin intuitively knew that she literally meant not flicking only his arm, but probably anywhere else on him. "Nor will you flick my face."

Her green eyes widened. "How the hell did you know that?"

Zamasu frowned, taking on an obvious tone. "Because I can read minds?"

"WHAT?!"

Her exclamation was enough to make Ollie audibly yap. The pug looked at his owner with a bit of concern, because even her voice cracked. Zamasu blinked. "Yes."

"Are you serious?! So have you been everybody's mind during the day?"

A scoff. " _No_ ," he crossed his arm. "If I did, I would want to punch a wall or something."

"...Even in the car earlier?"

A pause resounded in the car, because he was indeed trying to read her mind earlier, just to see why she was hiding so much on behalf of her hospital and her behavior towards the black vans. But he was going to be honest and truthful, like the man he is at heart. "Yes."

This made her kind of nervous, and he expected that because she was hiding things. If one doesn't have anything to hide, they shouldn't be nervous at all. She turned into a highway different from the one they traveled through earlier. "I didn't know you can just randomly create stuff and read people's minds, that's… _wow_."

Even if his abilities are considerable superpowers by her species' standards, he was still humble about having them since they were so commonplace. Actual Kaioshins have amassed greater control in the same abilities as he had, only he took a shorter amount of time to aptly use them. Being on Earth however, he never really been inclined to using his powers at all, since everything he's dealt with so far has been either annoying or just harmless.

"Well I can see why you hate humans now."

That piqued his attention. "How?"

"You can read minds and you're stuck with us. I'm pretty sure as you were walking around the airport, you caught whiff of some really fucked up thoughts."

At this point, he's gotten so used to the cursing he heard throughout the day that he didn't even check Rebecca for letting it slip. "It's not something I cannot control. I read minds at will."

" _Ohhh…_ well, thank god for that." She exhaled.

"Thank who?"

"Thank-" she stopped and looked at him. "Sheesh, it's just a figure of speech. I'm not actually thanking like… God or anything."

Perhaps she doesn't remember what exactly he was, but he'll just remind her exactly. "Kaioshins are gods."

"Wait, really?" The curious look on her face would have been seen as cute by anyone else.

"I have said this before around you, haven't I?"

She raised a brow, looking at the road ahead and keeping a steady speed, and then she said 'Ahhh' in epiphany. "Wow, so then that technically means I would be thanking you for not reading every person's mind… that sounds weird."

"Exactly."

"But that's something I and a lot of people been used to." She raised her free hand, letting her elbow rest against the armrest. "Not everyone has spoken with a green God at least once in their lives, you know."

"You're around me." He sat back into his seat. "Get _unused_ to it."

Rebecca pouted. "Zamasu, c'mon now. It's not that big a deal."

"Yes it is."

Her shoulders slouched. "Why is it such a bother? If I said 'Oh my God', then that should be okay because you're a God, a god of creation for that matter, and I'm technically saying that you're my God, aren't I?"

Zamasu closed his eyes, because this phrase was always used in conjunction with some incident that incorrectly took place. "If a person did something wrong on their own behalf, would you like it if they exclaimed your name?"

She raised a finger, and then she set it back down understanding what he was saying. "You're… you're right. You know what, I won't say the term like that around you again, is that 'kay?"

"That's fine." He smirked, and Rebecca looked at him just in time to catch the curvature of his lips. She laughed, and he looked at her. "What?"

She didn't say anything, and then Zamasu's face flickered a frown before giving her a cross look. "Stop saying 'my God' in your head repetitively."

Rebecca's lips parted in consternation. "Dude, can you not be so intrusive?"

"You literally thought ' _I wonder if he's reading my mind_ ' before recursively thinking what you just thought." He narrowed his eyes. "Don't make me circumvent your thought process."

They approached a green light, which turned red right before Rebecca got a chance to pass it. She groaned, but looked at him. "So what you're telling me is that you're gonna read my thoughts and call me out on them?"

"Precisely."

"Just to annoy me?"

"For better reason than that."

She paused, looked at him, and then back at the road. "Fair enough." _Mr. God…_

"Do you want to push your luck?"

"I'm sorry."

She looked sort of flushed, but he ignored her and made a 'Hmmph' sound. "Very well, then."

Rebecca stayed silent, now able to fully concentrate on the road. It was relatively early in the day actually, just an hour and fifteen minutes from noon. She expected them to be at home just before noon if they don't make any stops anywhere and judging from how Zamasu literally didn't need anything, they'd probably be on their way directly home. Her thoughts randomly went back to the bit of shopping she did earlier this week; Lexi and she randomly came up with the idea during a very long phone call to take the entire crew to a winter resort. They didn't actually talk it out with the others because this idea was a spur of the moment type of thing, and now they had a full month to reflect and decide on behalf of it. Of course, the place that they would go needed reservations and she would've opted for a private resort, one that they can book with no one else there but them. The one thing that Rebecca wanted to look out for was outdoor hot tubs, because why wouldn't you want that in a winter resort?

She went out to buy new winter paraphernalia, like coats, some boots and tougher pairs of pants, and also a new bikini for the sake of next summer. It was a pearl white trikini to be exact, and it sake in a bag in the back of her car because she did need to return it; it happened to be too tight around her chest. _It's funny because my breasts aren't even that big to begin with_ , they haven't grown since her third year in highschool, and it's not like she wanted them to grow any further, but it's surprising to find something in the right size that didn't suit her chest area. Maybe it was meant to be like that, but then again that would probably look a little raunchy; the last thing she wanted to do was to have her female friends and four full-grown men bear _too much witness_ to her bosom.

If only one could feel another reading their mind _accidentally_ , then Rebecca wouldn't have visualized what she looked like before and after she wore the trikini.

Unfortunately for the Kaioshin, because luck just doesn't seem to work for gods at all, he mistakened her silence for her trying to egg him on to reading her mind again and being silly. So being rather inquisitive, he decided to tap into her head for a split second, and ended up getting a _clear_ glimpse of what Rebecca was thinking about. The ability to read minds did not exclude visual representations of thoughts, and for any Kaioshin whether they be apprenticed or not, such a medium was more profound for them because they were naturally a visual species.

His elbow was already resting against the car door, and the mantled Kaioshin rested his temple on his pointer finger while _slowly_ looking out the window, because he literally just got a vision of a naked red-haired woman for a mere millisecond. That's one million nanoseconds… and _that_ is a _giant_ number.

"Hey, Zamasu, you mind if I go somewhere before heading home?"

It's even worse because she has no clue of him accidentally tapping into her head. _This is why_ , Zamasu lamented himself, _this is why you train before becoming a Kaioshin… so you don't end up getting meddled with things like this._ He just continued keeping his face towards the window so that she wouldn't see him. "I don't mind."

"Mmkay, because I gotta return something real quick." She reached behind the back of her seat to grab a white bag while looking forward out at the road. When Rebecca got hold of it, she placed it on Zamasu's lap, telling him to 'wait a sec' because she had to make a few very tedious turns. This part of the road happened to be a little too haphazard. He looked down and into the bag, seeing the same pearl white trikini she was thinking about.

The explicit image of her that he suffered from earlier popped up again, and he quickly whipped his direction back to the window.

Don't you hate when you see something and you just can't unsee it right afterwards? And now that he thought of it that way, it became even more difficult to just throw that out of his mind. She flickered her gaze to the bag and took it from of his forsakened lap. "I kinda gotta go and exchange this. I tried it earlier this week and it just didn't fit right, so…"

 _ **I already know that**_. _No, Zamasu, no you don't. Stop mentally uttering its existence!_ "Go ahead. You really don't need to ask my permission for such a thing."

She did though, because there was no such thing as not having something weird randomly happening to him when he least expected it. "I just thought I'd make sure, so you don't get too bored, ya know? I'll just turn right here…" She made a left turn, "instead." They reached another stoplight, and she took this time to look at him. "What's wrong?"

"What?"

"What's up? Why aren't you looking at me?"

"Oh." he didn't know if the flustered-ness of his face receded within the past ten seconds, but judging from how adamant he was at not moving it probably wasn't. "I'm just looking out the window."

His nonchalant voice was enough to not make her second guess. "Oh, well alright. Thought something was wrong." A tiny chuckle came from the woman as she accelerated once more, seeing the light become green.

Ten minutes afterwards, Zamasu was introduced to a large mall with vibrant colors all around. Rebecca found a parking spot within a dozen seconds, and she finally stopped her car, taking the bag with her. Ollie barked out, and Rebecca looked at her pug. "I'm gonna be gone for several minutes, hun. Just sit tight, your buddy is here with you."

She motioned to Zamasu and Ollie slowly went to him and sat quietly on his lap. Rebecca smiled at the both of them. "I'll be right back." And she closed the car door.

Ollie looked up at Zamasu, and he looked down at Ollie. The Kaioshin blinked, and then Ollie blinked. "So umm…" he shrugged, unable to find something to make Ollie do. The pug wouldn't even budge in his spot. "I guess you're going to just… sit here until she comes back, I supposed."

The pug tilted his head as Zamasu spoke to him, and the Kaioshin placed his hands on Ollie's sides and picked him up slowly, watching as his tongue peeked out of his mouth. His face became even more pudgy when Zamasu picked him up, and out of alacrity, Ollie did that damned adorable smile at him again. Well, since nobody was here, Zamasu could revel in the cuteness, and that's exactly what he did. He placed Ollie back on his lap, and the pug laid on his back, having that giant smile on his face again. The Kaioshin had a rare smile on his face as he rubbed the pug's stomach, and Ollie started rolling around in his spot making elated noises at the contact. Suddenly, the pug sprung up and went to the back of the car, and Zamasu raised a brow. The pug was rummaging through something behind him, and Zamasu couldn't fully turn around without shifting in his seat.

"What are you doing back there?"

There was no response, no bark or yip or anything. Ollie just continued his scavenging.

Zamasu turned back forward, looking around the parking lot, he heard the shuffling stop and Ollie jumped back into his lap with a toy in his mouth. This toy was a white rectangle with a bunch of chunky colorful buttons on either side. The pug set the toy in Zamasu's lap right between the both of them, and yipped.

Zamasu figured the pug wanted him to do something with this toy, he looked at Ollie who now sat politely in front of him. He inhaled. "Fine…"

Ollie pushed one of the buttons on his side, and pushed another. He then pushed a few buttons and the green button on the far right and a little compartment popped up and revealed a bone shaped dog treat. Zamasu took the treat in his hand intrigued, only having a couple of seconds to look at it before Ollie's mouth was on his fingertips.

He cocked his neck back at the blatant impatience of the pug before him. "Well, _excuse you_." Ollie continued to chow down on the treat, big eyes on the Kaioshin. His mouth did this thing where it would look like he was pouting every time he chewed and the Kaioshin narrowed his eyes. He looked down at the toy and started pressing the buttons, trying to understand what the heck the objective of this thing is. A blue, then a yellow, then red, he pressed multiple buttons more than once and within several seconds, the compartment popped up again. Before Zamasu could reached for it, Ollie ate the little treat with _the quickness_.

The Kaioshin looked down at the dog, and pursed his lips. "So you're just going to snatch those before I do?"

Ollie barked, and started pushing the buttons again, which made the suddenly competitive Kaioshin push the buttons. Obviously, being a Kai blessed him with outstanding intelligence, but because he didn't know how this thingy worked, Ollie ended up pressing a button that made the treat pop up again. Without hitch, Zamasu snatched the treat from where it was, and Ollie looked up at him and blinked. The man snickered as he held the treat high on his fingertips, and Ollie reached up to retrieve it.

Zamasu waved his finger. "No no, this is mine. _Not_ yours."

Ollie sat back, looked directly at Zamasu and made a noise. Then, he looked back down and started pushing more buttons.

 _So it's a battle then_ , the two individuals were now pushing the colored buttons and getting as many treats the both of them could amass as possible. Ollie ended up with around five while Zamasu had four in left hand. The Kaioshin during this time took great consideration for how _intelligent_ Rebecca's dog was; even if Zamasu was an expert in strategizing, the pug was ahead of him at the moment. He also realized just how stupid he looked competing against a mere _dog_ , pushing buttons and snatching treats that he didn't even need, but surprisingly, it didn't seem to bother him as much as much as it should. Probably because he was with an innocent being who wasn't tainted and ill like a human. Unknown to him, the same woman who was allowing him to stay with her for month stood right outside her window watching as the two toggle-duked it out. Ollie pressed the yellow button twice, and the treat popped up again. A green hand and a paw slammed against the toy on either side of the treat, and Zamasu and Ollie gave one another a crafty look.

The car door opened, making Zamasu and Ollie turn, and Rebecca leaned forward with a smile on her face. "You two are honestly the _absolute cutest_."

The doctor stepped in and plopped down on her seat, the pug turned back to face Zamasu's cheek and looked down at the treat. The pug swiped it from underneath his hand, making Zamasu look back at him, and he happily ate the kibble. "So who won?"

He gave her a look, sort of fazed by how casually she could be seeing a Kaioshin play a simple toy and have so much fun doing so. He looked down at Ollie and narrowed his eyes. "He did." The Kaioshin rubbed the back of his head, and Ollie made a satisfied sound.

"I'm not surprised, he's a friggin master at that thing. Even Loki can't beat him, and he's the more 'strategic' one, per say." She placed the bag, which was now a bit bigger than before, on her armrest instead of giving it to him and started up her car. "I exchanged what I had for a… more fitting size. I bought other things too, even though I probably didn't need to."

"I figured it would."

"What?"

Zamasu looked back at her. "Huh?" He just realized that Rebecca didn't know of what he seen in his mind's eye, which in turn made him remember what he saw, which made him inwardly flustered. "Umm… nothing. I didn't say anything."

She blinked, looked up at her ceiling with a look, and turned to him. "You're a bad liar, you know that?"

He placed the toy in the back of her car and Ollie wen back to his seat. "You don't know that."

"I do, and you do too." The car left the parking lot, and they were off into the road.

"How would you know if I knew?" He placed his hands on his hips.

"Well, it's not hard to see that you're not good at lying, and I know that, and I know that you know that I know."

He frowned. "What makes you think that you know that I'm a bad liar?"

"What makes you think that I _don't_ know that you're a bad liar?"

The Kaioshin narrowed his eyes. "You don't know me. So I know that you don't know, because you haven't spent enough time around me to know."

"Well, what if you didn't know that I knew?"

"How am I going to not know if you knew if I know that don't?"

She side eyed him. "But you don't know that I don't."

"Yes I do."

"How so?"

"Because…" he tilted his head.

A pause, and then she raised a brow. "Because what?"

"Because I just know."

"That doesn't help anything." She shook her head and smiled. "What you know is different from what I know. So if I know that you know, and you don't know that I know, then who's to say that you know that I don't know?"

Anyone listening to these two will end up wanting to headbang a cheese grater or some nonsensical thing. "I know you don't know, but I do know."

Rebecca smirked. "So you're saying that you know you're a bad liar?"

"Exactly." Zamasu closed his eyes and definitively crossed his arms after proving himself right… and then they shot open. "Wait…"

Full on laughter came from Rebecca, and he grimaced at her. How did he manage to get outwitted by this woman? The red haired woman placed her hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, Zamasu. At least you've self-evaluated."

He groaned, annoyed. "You were getting a kick out of this, weren't you?"

"... _Kindaaaaa_." She giggled.

"Get off of me." He straight-faced and pushed her hand off of him. It was very different from the way he and Irene communicated; Rebecca exhibits the same playful nature as her, the only difference is that trait of her makes her more… gravitating? He didn't know the exact word for it, but with Rebecca it was rather tame and more interesting. With Irene, he couldn't make it through one interaction without wanting to kick her throat inwards.

For the next thirty minutes of the drive, Rebecca raised random topics which got a bit of ruse from him, funnily enough. She opened up a holographic tablet that was in her bag and pressed a few buttons which opened up her garage, and parked her car right next to the black car Zamasu had recognized before. He actually never seen her garage before; it was underneath her house of course, having a special large door that opens to reveal it. The floor was a concrete gunmetal color and the walls were rose quartz. There wasn't as much lavish decor in the garage room as her living room, per say, but that was obviously due to the fact that this room served the single purpose of just parking cars. That's what he figured. He stepped out of the car, and Rebecca opened her trunk for him to get his suitcase telling him to close it afterwards. And she took Ollie upwards with her. He followed suit, going up the stairs to where the living room was, and the Kaioshin had to blink twice; he completely forgot how _big_ this house was.

Ollie was already in his fluffy green bedding, playing with a squishy plush toy Rebecca bought for him at the souvenir shop. His owner placed her bag on the large sofa and she looked at the Kaioshin. "Are you just gonna stand there? Get yourself comfortable, Zamasu."

There was one single, question that Zamasu belabored after his past four or five or something hours of being out. " _May I take this off_?" He gestured to the clothing he was wearing. Rebecca laughed.

"Yes you may, I figured that would be the first thing you'd ask me. But first…" she went up to him and then walked around him, making the Kaioshin follow her movements in suspicion. "I don't mean this in any negative way, but uhh…" What she was about to say was hard to put in a way that didn't sound insulting. She didn't know if his species had showers or baths like they did, or they do that kind of stuff for fun or something. "You know what showers are right?"

"The things that you humans use to clean yourselves, correct?"

 _Clear description_. "Yup. Uhh…"

He caught what she was trying to say, and narrowed his eyes.. "Are you trying to hint at me smelling a certain way?"

"No, no no, I thought you'd enjoy one, like you know… just for the sake of doing it. Maybe a bath, I think you'd like a soothing, hot bath."

He frowned. "Isn't the main purpose of that to clean yourself?"

"Well, yes. But you can bathe when you're not in need of one." She really wasn't trying to say offensive, the Kaioshin could tell that from her almost timid demeanor. Rebecca then took a step closer and inhaled a few times. "You don't even smell like anything, so why would I say you _needed_ a bath?"

"Did you just sniff me?" He gave her the most surprised, yet disconcerted look that she ever seen. "You don't just _sniff_ a God."

She flailed her arms. "Well I dunno- I was trying to verify the fact that I recommended a bath because I thought you'd enjoy it, not like…" She sighed, and Zamasu shook his head.

"There are better ways to counteract your connotation. You _know_ that." He crossed his eyes.

Rebecca looked back at him. "How do you know that I know that?"

"I refuse to have this conversation again!" The Kaioshin quickly turned around, ignoring her giggles. "We're not bringing this up, before you… meddle with my mind again-I hate that." He then took a few steps up her stairs, and then stopped and turned around. "I've never been up here…"

She frowned. "Huh? Oh it's fine, you can go upstairs, and bring your clothes with you. I'll show you to your room."

The both went upstairs to her spacey, long hallway. The hall was a ruby red color with darker shaded embossed designs, and the doors, carpeted floor, and ceiling were a clean, quartz white much like her living room. She went down three closed doors, the very first one being Loki's room, and the second one Ollie's. The third one was, in her own words, just 'kinda there in case if she needed something', and the fourth one was the room he was given. She opened the door and Zamasu had no other reaction other than amazement.

What is with these giant rooms he's been getting ownership to?

There was an _expensive_ looking bed right in front of him with a marble-esque bed frame, having about seven or nine different assortments and types of pillows which confused him, and and small cushion table rest at the foot of the bed. There was no closet, or maybe there was-he really didn't know- a large drawer on the right side of the room along with a well-kept desk that had a movable light source and a holographic clock (the same one Irene had), and a door that lead to perhaps a separate room. On the left was a _literal_ lounge area with comfy chairs, a curved sofa, and a table that… had a lit-up never ending hole in it? He'll look at that in a second, but the ceiling had a built-in light that looked like a small platform off its surface, it was enough to light the entire room.

"...What…" His voice literally trailed on because this was too much to handle in one sitting. How can a person's room be this big? It was phenomenal…

Rebecca did that giggling thing again. "It's not really much but, this will be your place for the month-"

"It's not much?!" He exclaimed. "I reckon that is a _huge understatement_."

She got flustered. "I take it you like the room?"

He took a step forward. The floor was carpeted with ivory polyester; if one were to feel the carpet, they'd probably have no problem sleeping on the floor if they had to. The inquisitive nature got the best of him when he looked down at the table in the lounge area. It had an onyx black frame with rainbow lights around the frame that seemed to _descend forever_ inside of the table, fading away as they further were. Zamasu's bewildered observations made Rebecca smile at the endearing scene. "...How does this happen?"

He was pointing at the table. "Oh, it's an infinity table. If you put lights in it, they just reflect all the way down until you can't see them anymore." Zamasu was now standing in front of the table; he then knelt down to look underneath the table to see if he'd find that same light-abyss that he saw on it's surface only to find that the bottom of it looked completely normal. He seriously did not understand the sorcery behind this furniture.

"It's made with a two-way and one-way mirror, and when they are placed on top of each other, they create a never-ending reflection like that." She pointed, and Zamasu nodded, understanding the making of this extraordinary thing.

"That's… interesting." The Kaioshin realized that the lights were faintly pulsing too.

"You can change the color scheme of it too." She went to the shorter side of the table, and motioned for him to look at what she was doing. Out slides a small clandestine compartment underneath the surface of the table, and it was a electric screen that had color selections. There were presets, as well as an option to customize a color scheme and make your own.

"So this is set to rainbow. You can tap on one of these to enable the colors to change, like… let's say I'll make this different shades of green…" He watched her select the color green and set that to random, then he looked up at the surface of the table. It was indeed now an endless lit up border of various hues of green. "There ya go. When you're done, just slide this back in." She chuckled at his childlike awe. Sometimes he reminded her of an innocent child with how unknowing, yet intuitive he was. "You'll get the chance to look at everything. I gotta show you your own bathroom too, ya know."

That caught his attention. "My own _bathroom_?"

"Yup." She nodded. "It's that door right there." The same door that Zamasu glanced at earlier was where his bathroom was. She stood up and opened the door, motioning for Zamasu to come along. The Kaioshin made his way towards where she was standing in order to take a look and-

"You mean that all of this… is part of _my_ room?"

What he meant by _all of this_ was, his bathroom had both a shower and a bathtub, a bathroom countertop with a sink, a toilet, a couple of potted plants, and the entire theme of the room was pale soapstone green and white. The glass that encompassed the shower area was even tinted a pale green color, and there were steps leading to the bathtub which was made of marble and was big enough to fit at least two people. A horizontal hanger had a robe and a few towels hung neatly, and the floor was tiled white, the walls adorned in green soapstone.

"Yes it is yours." She nodded. "I'll just show you how the tub works so that you can like… use it and stuff." Rebecca told him what the dials did and showed him the different kinds of scents that he could use. She did the same with the shower, adding the fact that he can adjust the water pressure and the thing actually lights up. She asked if he wanted to bathe, and after his response she turned on the water, telling him that it needed to fill up before he could use it, and implemented oils to the bath. "See? I think that's about it, so I'll just let you- oh wait, I almost forgot! Come here." Rebecca walked out of the room.

There's _more?_ The Kaioshin followed suit and Rebecca was pointing at a button on the wall. She pressed the button and the inconspicuous wall pulled a region of itself back and parted right in the middle, sliding into either side and revealing another part of his room. "This is your closet."

He shook his head, perplexed. "This is… this is too much." You mean to tell him that he gets to sit in _this_ room all day? All he needed was a bookshelf and he'd be set for the entire month. "It's a lot- I don't even think I'd need 5 percent of this room."

She smirked. "Well, you can have 100 percent of this room." She clasped her hands. "That's just about it. You can do whatever you gotta do now, I'm gonna go change and get comfy downstairs so, unless if you're joining then, goodnight." A smile graced her lips and she waved at him, opening his room door and closing it after she exited.

The Kaioshin took the deepest breath in, finally elated that he can take this human clothing off. He didn't need to rummage through his suitcase because his gi was the first thing he had saw, so he pulled it out and neatly placed it on his new bed. Completely taking off all of the stupid clothing, he let out an exhale of relief at the _freedom_ he physically felt; not that his clothes wasn't comfortable because truthfully they sort of were, but because the entire morning consisted of him being literal eye candy to _most_ women and _some_ men and it was _not fun_ at all. He went to the lavish bathroom greeted by the strong scent of peppermints, and turned the water off seeing as it was high enough to be right below the edge if he sat in it. The Shinjin species _never_ have a problem with hygiene so all that extra stuff humans do did not apply to his race, _obviously._ He stepped into the tub toes first, almost _shuddering_ at the sudden comforting warmth. Another leg in and he finally sunk within the soothing bathtub, a relaxed sigh came from his green lips as he stretched his arms out to rest against the edge of the tub. The Kaioshin even fully submerged himself in there for a good twenty seconds, and came back up without hitch.

Zamasu was leaning back resting his head against the tub's edge, bathing in warm, peppermint scented water in an expensive looking bathroom. When was the _last_ time this Kaioshin was ever as laid back as now?

There really wasn't a time like that. Even in his earliest years when he was tiny, the Kaioshin didn't have a sense of _relaxing_ like this. The only form of relaxation he had was through books, learning new techniques of fighting or drinking tea; not saying that either one of those were _boring_ , but now he was introduced to other ways beings can take their minds off of things they lament thinking about. That brought his train of thought to humans themselves, and how they didn't think about all the atrocities committed by those in their race. One thing was common between Irene and Rebecca regarding what he figured from their chat before arriving at the airport; they had an entire conversation regarding the nefarious black vans, and ended up dismissing the weight of such an interaction soon after. Despite those two women being wealthy, they had many materialistic assets in their lives that _didn't_ remind them of how horrible their race was. Perhaps that's what humans have done; open up enough distractions to their own fellow species to both disregard, and become desensitized to such atrocities. Irene and her group do nothing but humor each other with jokes and remarks, and when they have deeper conversations they failed to get just as rightfully emotional as he would. Perhaps that was their way of ignoring the dirty actions that looked before them.

No, it _was_ their way of _coping,_ maybe, with how truly terrible the idea of death and destruction was, something that's become an adage to humanity.

The best thing to do in dire situations is to make humor out of anything in order to keep from drowning in mournful sorrow. Zamasu doesn't do any of that; he saw the deeds done by this species hundreds of times over as what it was, and this wasn't the _first_ time such conflict would deteriorate humans and mortals. He has seen hundreds upon hundreds of civilizations fall and crumble because one; those within it were too busy fighting to take a look at what they have _done_ , and two; everyone else was either too oblivious to it or chose to ignore it completely. No human being would amount any of that sorrow and be able to comprehend it. Rebecca may be rich, but at least she can vouch for what he was thinking, whereas Irene, other than during that earlier conversation, never really tried to see where he was coming from _if she even could._ Although he was perceiving all of this, he was still laying back in the tub calm as ever, soaking up the scent of peppermints.

The Kaioshin had been in there long enough for the water to become cool in surface temperature, and he decided that he'd finally get out. Standing and leaving the tub, he did that thing that Rebecca to drain the clear water down, using one of the larger towels to dry his body and hair up right after. Zamasu sighed; he truthfully felt… serene. Rebecca wasn't lying when she said that he would enjoy a warm bath. Even as he left the bathroom, his eyes were lidded more than usual and without really thinking about it, he went straight to his new bed and laid down on it.

You know that feeling when something makes you so comfortable, it almost makes you cry? Zamasu never had the thought to fully appreciate his bed in Irene's house or how soft it was, but what he was lying on was just… _how could something like this exist without him knowing?_. He turned over to face the lit ceiling, hands squeezing against the soft material of the blanket underneath him. His actions soon followed with no other thoughts, just on feeling. He shifted a little bit upwards, pulling the covers up and slipping underneath it resting his head against the plethora of pillows...

 _Sweet Kami_ …

Zamasu was basking in the sweet covers of his new bed, arms outwards with his hands lying beneath the pillow that rested below his head. He closed his eyes and took a calm breath inwards; the Kaioshin found no reason to get up anytime soon.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **This chapter was far too freaking cute, I apologize greatly for it kind of :3.**

 **Irene has finally left, and Zamasu is now with Rebecca for a month. You would think that since he no longer has to deal with Irene for a full thirty days that his life would get easier and much more peaceful within the next thirty days?**

 **If only the story had some semblance of normalcy,** _ **that would have been possible.**_


	15. Open Opportunities

**I'm not trying to spoil anything, but if you get to the part where a Mongolian man is mentioned, read his dialogue in a Mongolian accent. Just do it for shits and gigs, you won't regret it.**

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 **Open Opportunities**

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Nearing dusk of today, Adrian, Ashley, Jay, Lexi and James drove themselves out to a bar in West City. This place was actually where one would find celebrities in the most because it was indeed one of the best bars in the country, any normal person who came here on any day would have a high chance of seeing a famous person. Some celebrities would be bombarded by fans and that was just their nature, and others would end up finding really cool avid people of their work or their decree, even chatting and having drinks with regular people. Not everyone is that stuck up.

For the duo-couple, they really had no problem with their fans, due to how connected they were which in turn allows a lot of people to see them as _legitimate_ humans. The same thing goes for Ashley and Lexi although it was a bit different; Ashley was a writer, she had many great books and projects under her name, and when was the last time you saw a crazy fanatic of any kind of author? Lexi's occupation may have painted her as this overly gorgeous woman (and she is), but the model's fanbase was relatively tame and was branched out to different kind of people, especially those in the field of martial arts thanks to her boyfriend, mostly. James, on the other hand, would need a few security guards because if not, the females would be all over him and he'd be trampled by them.

Due to the surge in people of stature, the bar ended up getting a bunch of money, since celebrities buy really expensive drinks in the first place, and adopted their own form of tight security. There were guards outside that sort of resembled bouncers and this bar had gotten bigger over the years. It took on a much more modern and tech-savvy appearance but did salvage it's oaky theme, and the entire premise was solar powered. Within the bar, the group was in one of the large lounging areas of the bar, enjoying drinks as they talked about random stuff.

James looked at the people in the group. "So… which one would you guys do; drink trash juice, or drink 6-month expired milk?"

And random it was, _indeed_.

They were reading off of some site that generated random _Would You Rather's_ or just choosy questions in general because that sounded fun to them. Adrian raised a finger. "...Are there specifics, other than the freaking milk?"

"It's two cups of trash juice, and one whole gallon of expired milk, my fault. Uhhh," James was kind of wincing at both ideas. "I mean like… what do they mean by trash juice? Like two cups of some random juice found in a trash?"

" _Pfft I fucking wish_." Jay shook his head. "It's like… you get a trash bag right, and then you squeeze it to make all the juices come out-"

Everyone, including Jay, made disgusted _'ugh'_ sounds before he could even finish.

"Like… uh, fuck," Adrian placed his bottle down. "Milk, when it's expired, it's all… chunky and sour and tastes like really shitty sour cream-"

"How do you know this?" Ashley looked at her boyfriend. "That is too descriptive, dude. I don't wanna imagine having to ingest a whole gallon of that."

"My friends back in high school had some shit ideas." That made her even more confused. "We won't talk about that."

"I mean- okay." Lexi held out her hands as though she were making a sophisticated comparison. "You get two cups of trash juice, but if you think about it, it could be like one shot full. I mean, they didn't _specify_ what cup you had to use, but still…"

"You guys gotta choose, man." James looked down, appalled at his own decision. "I'll have to go with spoiled milk to be honest."

Ashley was the first one to vocalize the disgust. "Ugh!"

He raised his hands. "Okay, okay look, if you think about it in the _long run_ … spoiled milk won't fuck up your breath and your dignity as much as _trash juice_ would."

Adrian's hand was on his chin. "I really, really don't wanna choose…"

"I gotta say trash juice." Lexi shook her head.

"WHAT?!" The Asian male next to her exclaimed. "Are you deadass?!"

"Look, it's _two cups_. One whole gallon of spoiled would fuck with your stomach for a pretty long time, you'll get food poisoning!"

" _Okay_ , but trash juice is disgusting! You'll puke it out before you're on your second cup."

"Well then I can handle that... what did you choose?" Lexi was not sounding as adamant as she could have because this ain't something you'd do with any sort of alacrity. Unless you like the taste of trash juice or something.

"Uhh… milk. I don't think I'll ever love myself if I drank two cups of fucking trash juice." Jay looked at James. "Why did you load that one up?"

The basketball player's shoulders went up. "These are random, for fucks sake. I didn't want to skip any one of them."

"I think you _might_ need to start doing that." Ashley waved her hands, denying this entire conversation's existence. "Please, for the sake of us. What's the next one?"

"Thank God, umm let's see." He loaded up another one. "Wait real quick, did you guys text some of the others to come through?"

Adrian looked down at his phone, eager to forget what had transpired. "I texted… I texted Vivian, he's on his way, annnnd Shona, and…"

"The fuck, you know Vivian and Shona?!" Ashley knew her boyfriend knew a lot of famous people, but she didn't know his reach was that far.

Vivian is a well known fashion designer, and Shona is one of the most famous actors in the world. Adrian smiled at her response. "Yea, he's a friggin cool guy and so is Vivian."

"Vivian is funny as fuck." Jay snorted. "He'll liven up this party, no challenge."

"Doesn't he have a crush on me?" James looked at the Asian male.

"Nobody would have a crush on you." Jay took a blatant sip on his Zamayaki whiskey.

"Uhh, say that to my girlfriend and the amount of fans that scream my name whenever I'm in their presence." James narrowed his eyes at Jay.

Just to be an asshole, Lexi smirked. "I don't hear no screaming."

James gave her a look, which caused the others to laugh. After cooling down, Adrian looked back down. "Kiran is coming too."

"Isn't she on tour right now?" Lexi raised a brow.

"Her tour ended two weeks ago. Get with the program." Ashley gave her a dunce on the head.

"Yeah, Lex'." Adrian snickered and the model threw a napkin at him.

"I don't condone violence towards my girlfriend." Jay raised his finger at Ashley.

"You guys _sparred_ before we decided to come out here." The biracial male had his hand gesturing between the two, Ashley and James chiming in too.

The couple just looked at one another then back at the others, and spoke simultaneously. "That's besides the point."

"Geez, you two…" James shook his head. "Alright, we gotta get back on these Would You Rather's and shit. So… ohhh, I got a good one; eat a zombie, or be eaten by a zombie?"

"You know, we asked to not have disgusting ones, and you give us this…" Ashley straight-faced.

"It's not that bad, it's actually an easy question…" James looked down at his tablet screen, re-reading the questionnaire again and then he muttered 'it's not that easy' under his breath while shaking his head.

"I'd just get eaten." Ashley concluded. "Rotten meat is a no-no."

"Same." Lexi took a sip from her glass of red wine.

Jay agreed as well. "I can't do that. I'd probably die from eating it in the first place."

"But then again, if you do eat it and die, wouldn't it be less painful than getting eaten?" Adrian reasoned. "Either way, you're gonna end up dying."

"Hmm…" Ashley was putting his idea into consideration. "Still get eaten."

"Nah, I'm with my boy though. I'll take the plunge and eat a zombie." James dapped Adrian up. "Because at that point I wouldn't just give a shit anymore and there ain't no restaurant opened or something so… if I survive, cool; but if I die, it's still cool."

"That was reasonable. Ehhh, I think it's now 50-50." Lexi made a so-so gesture with her hand, and then she reached for the tablet. "What's the next one?"

Adrian got two texts within three seconds. "Yooo, Vivian and Kiran are right outside, guys."

Just when he said that, two individuals walked in separately, the first one being an average height male and a female who was shorter. He had midtone skin, striking brown eyes and straight jet black hair that went down to his chest, his facial features being rather feminine which was a bit accentuated by the sleek thin eyeliner around his eyes. The guy was wearing a black beanie, a gray cutout shoulder tunic and blue slim jeans. The woman had a more golden complexion with hazel eyes and full lips, her loose wavy hair was brown with highlights and it cascaded down to her mid back. She was wearing a red fringe top with a lighter shade of short red pants. The group saw them walking in as indicated by Adrian, and gave out an inviting ''Eyy' to the two.

Vivian, the said fashion designer, snapped his fingers while pointing at them with a smile. "Yooo, what's good?!" He went up to Adrian and gave him a dap, and did the same for the other guys, giving the girls hugs. "Dude, I haven't seen you in a while! I've been waiting to hang with all of you motherfuckers- wait, she's part of this?"

He was pointing at Kiran, who looked just as surprised as he was. Jay spoke. "Yes, did you not see her?"

Vivian nodded. "Well _yeah_ , but we just said 'Hi', you know, and then that was just it."

Kiran looked at him. "We did nothing more than one of those 'Nice to meet you' handshakes that celebs do when they come here."

"Well guess that, you two know each other, now get some drinks and join us because we're uhh…" Jay scratched the back of his head.

"Would You Rather, basically. Maybe even Smash or Pass." Lexi clarified it for Jay. "It was shitty and disgusting." She batted an eye at James.

"You guys are getting mad at me for a random generating questionnaire thing." He kissed his teeth. "You two, pick your booze, chill with us… it's a stoked night."

"I think Shona just pulled up, too." Adrian was leaning forward to look out one of the windows away from the lounge seeing a rather expensive car roll up in the driveway.

"Okay look, if you keep leaning forward like that, you're gonna fall on me. Steady your shit." Jay pushed him back.

"I wouldn't fall, I'm not as clumsy as you, Mr. Vertigo."

Jay slapped his arm playfully. "Suck one."

Kiran looked at the red wine glass bottle Lexi had. "Lemme see this real quick, I wanna know what kind of wine this is."

Lexi regarded her curiosity. "To be honest, I wouldn't even finish all this wine. You can get a glass and we'll share this."

Vivian came back with a Sazerac cocktail. "Alright, I'm back. Start the shitshow, guys."

"It's already started." Adrian laughed. "We just need another person to come over and then I'm good."

Jay shrugged. "Shona can walk in while we're in the middle of this and just _know_ what we're doing off top."

Vivian's eyes went wide, he almost missed his glass. " _Shona_ though, how'd you manage to get Shona?"

"...via text." Adrian chuckled.

The fashion designer's eyes became saucers by now. "You have dude's number?!"

Ashley took a sip of her white wine. "Vivian, Adrian knows almost _everybody_. Name one famous person and Adrian's probably had at least one conversation with them."

"Lucky prick." Vivian shook his head and Adrian flicked his upper arm. The doors slid open and the same superactor they were talking about walks in to the bar. He was a Mongolian man who had an clean cut anchor beard, onyx black eyes, and chest length black hair. He was wearing a blue velvet dress shirt with black jeans and a pair of black loafers. After he had caught a waiters' attention and requested the beer he wanted, the man quickly spotted the group and Adrian's wave and approached them, all the while Ashley finding it a lot harder to breath normally because… one of her favorite actors was walking towards _her direction_.

Shona smiled, and he was one of those men who had such beautiful charming smiles. He had a slight accent due to spending a lot of his life in his mother country when he speaks. "Hello Adrian and people."

Adrian shook his hand, and he cordially greeted everybody. Jay smiled. "Ah, I got a fellow Asian here. This is great."

They got situated again, the group now becoming 8 varying millionaires in different professions sitting in a bar and having a good time. Some fans opted to take pictures of the group and some of the individuals as they answered random Would You Rather's, that was a part of their night.

"Ohhh this is a good question…" James' eyes flickered over to the girls in the group. "Guys, guys listen; _Ambrose_ , smash or pass-"

" _Smash_." Ashley and Lexi declared at the same time.

"Yup, I'd smash." Kiran and the girls shrugged at the guys' shock over their blatancy.

Lexi raised her brows. "Don't look all shocked at us, that man is freaking _gorgeous_! You've all seen his face and eyes and heard him sing or in interviews and just… _oooh_." The model made a squeezing notion with her hands.

"Well, someone is fangirling real hard." Adrian snickered.

"Look, I'd smash too- I'm pretty sure everyone in this group would smash, don't lie you guys." Vivian pointed a finger at the males sitting down, two of which were kind of looking around the room to his response.

"Aight… I wouldn't… necessarily have sex with him, but…" Adrian swirled his glass and pursed his lips in thought. Jay, Vivian, James, and Shona gave him a look, and he sort of gave in. "Okay, I _might_."

"Might?" Lexi asked. "How are you possibly saying 'might'?"

"Lexi, not all of us are into guys like _that_." James raised a hand.

"That man is a _multi-trillionaire_ , self-fucking made, too." Adrian tipped his glass.

"And he's hot. How many trillionaires do you know are as hot as him? They're usually old and shit." Kiran added on.

"That's true; he was rated as one the most beautiful men in the world. Shona fifths that list." Adrian smiled at the actor who narrowed his eyes.

"Great way to underhand me, Adrian."

"He is the only dude in the entire world, the whole wide world… who made me honestly question my sexuality, because _damn_." Jay shook his head in awe.

Ashley chuckled. "He probably doesn't live on Earth either, probably got a space mansion at this point."

"Nah, dude's probably got a mansion, a fucking _huge_ one, with a whole bunch of land to himself." Adrian said.

Jay added on. "I heard at one point that he's got his own forest, I think?"

"You guys are making up all types of theories and conspiracies." Shona shook his head while laughing.

"Dude, there's _way worse_ rumors and shit out there about him! Oh my god hold on." Vivian leaned forward.

"I gotta say something that's gonna fuck you guys up a little, right." James got the attention of everyone around him. "There has been this discussion going around regarding him, right. They are saying that he, Ambrose, might have a high functioning form of autism." That made everyone raise or furrow a brow. "I know right?"

"Because he's 30 years old and produced a bunch of the tech we have now? _Woooow_." Kiran shook her head.

"Well to be frank, a lot of geniuses around today do show a little bit of autism to some extent." Jay reasoned. "Ambrose started his business at 15, right after he co-worked with a former wealthy computer science agency. How many 15 years olds do you know could do _that_ shit?"

The fashion designer nodded. "And in a decade and a half, dude's got more money and owns more shit than all of us _combined_. If you multiply all our net worths by 10, we wouldn't even reach _three quarters_ of what he makes."

"We could never, he's got too many occupations;" Lexi started counting on her fingers as she spoke. "Computer engineer, biomechanic engineer, entrepreneur, software architect, fashion designer, he was a singer- this man's done a whole bunch!"

Ashley's nails drummed against the table. "Now, that autism theory doesn't sound that farfetched, but at the same time it'd be kind of jerky to assume that someone else has that shit."

The entire group agreed, and Shone held his glass in delicate hands. "At the end of the day, all these theories we've looked at are nothing but humor to us, really, since it isn't true."

"Agreed." The model clanked glasses with the actor. "Just gotta say though, people with autism have a weird ass thought process."

"Wooord. Quick story about that," Adrian was leaning back in his seat with his hand resting on the back of his head. "I have a friend who has autism, pretty high functioning one in fact. This guy is a prodigy in math -amazing with calculations and shit- and works as an accountant. One day he asked if I can come visit him in his office and me, I was thinking that his office would be, you know, normal and professional and shit like that… but NO," his arms were outstretched for extra emphasis, "I walk in, and the first thing I see is pictures around his workplace of _nude women_ \- just straight up on his walls all broad and shit- Shona is giving me a look, I know." Adrian chuckled. "And I'm not trying to say he was some kind of asshole or something, dude's a sweet guy don't get me wrong, but he legit had all these pictures of tits, ass, and other things on his walls. His calculator, which is a holographic touchscreen, even has tits on it, just fucking _tits_."

"Oh my god, I know who you're talking about! That's the guy who was with us a long time ago, right?" Jay pointed in recognition.

"Yeah, that dude exactly! So to my shock I was like 'What the heck dude, don't you get distracted or some shit?' And he looks at me nonchalantly and shit and just shakes his head and goes 'Nah man, _it goes with the theme of the room_."

Vivian blinked like four times, and then he busted out laughing. "WHAT THEME!?"

"His place was blue and white and all these portraits and shit had a blue or white undertone or some shit, which to be honest… the color scheme of the painting actually did fit with the office, I dunno." Adrian shrugged.

James nodded. "I like his mindset." That immediately made Kiran hit his arm. The singer frowned at him, and he just shrugged.

"You know what, the same guy happens to be a little synesthetic. So at one point he was doing his uber-fast calculating shit, and then a number came up and he started laughing." Adrian set his glass down. "Dude said that the number _sounded hilarious_."

"Okay, that is kind of more than a _little bit_ of synesthesia, Adrian." Ashley giggled. "Like the high-level synesthesia where you can feel music on you or something."

"I wouldn't mind that one, to be quite honest." Jay shrugged.

" _Imagine_." James snorted. "Back on this though; I'd pass, I don't.. Do dudes."

"Fuck, umm… I'm _conflicted_." Jay had a stupid smile on his face. "...I'm sorry, Lexi."

"You guys are the type to fight each other for this opportunity, to be quite frank." Vivian's remark made the group laugh.

"Wait, Vivian," Adrian looked at the fashion designer. "This is probably a stupid question but would you be a… a top or bottom?"

The black haired male scratched in chin, actually pondering this question. "Damn… shoot, I'd be a bottom but like… that's too much to handle though." He held his hands out gesturing. "Because his face is right in front of you, and you're looking into his gold eyes while he's-" Vivian stopped talking to take a breath and started fanning himself while cracking up. " _Shit_ , is there like a fan here or some shit?"

"Fucking _gayyyy_." James pointed an accusing finger at Vivian who just shrugged.

The designer flipped his hair back. "I never said I wasn't. _Shieeeet_ , I fabulously execute it anyway."

Lexi giggled. "Oh my god dude, on occasions where I was at one of the fashion shows and I'd walk through the runways I'd hear him somewhere in the front yelling 'Yasssss!' or 'Get it, bitch!' and I'm just like…"

"Listen," Vivian raised a finger. "Encouragement goes a long way, honey. If I see a friend killing it, I will tell you if you are." Taking another sip of his cocktail and he looked at the actor. "Shona? What would you choose?"

"Umm…" he looked down shyly. "Pass…"

Ashley gave him a comforting look. "I'm sorry that we dragged you into this."

"He didn't get dragged, he came on his own." Adrian smirked.

"Listen, when I came here I was _not_ expecting _this_." The Mongolian male gestured, then pushed his hair back. "I just came here for the sake of coming. I need a few drinks after what the heck happened earlier today."

Lexi honestly found Shona's Mongolian accent super cute. "Wait, what happened?"

"Allow me to take another sip and I'll tell you what happened-" He looked down at the glass, and then back at Lexi. "-Never mind, I'll tell you now." He took a savory sip of his sake, and set it down as the group had full ears on him.

"So, I was going to an interview earlier today- I shouldn't even give that information out, but that doesn't matter- and I got into the car and we drove out. Things were okay for a while until fifteen minutes later, there was a shootout right outside some store, I don't exactly know the name."

"Are you serious?!" Vivian even had to put his glass down. "You witness a fucking shootout?"

"Yes, my chauffeur had to U-turn and take a longer path to where the interview was supposed to be. One of the bullets managed to hit the side of the car, and there was a cop car coming within the scene. The weird thing is, it took ten minutes after we left to notify the important stations of it, which means that it probably took place far too fast for a full warning to be broadcasted."

"Shit, you're right. I just opened up a news story posted like six hours ago." Kiran was reading an article off of her phone. "The shootout happened like this; eight cars parked on the opposite sides of the road, one group in front of a jewelry store, and the other in next to a gas station. They came out simultaneously and started shooting at each other right off the bat- and I assume this was when your driver encountered this- this went on for fifteen minutes until more than dozen cop cars arrived, at which both opposing sides got back their cars and booked it at the _same time_." She frowned. "The fuck?"

Adrian shook his head. "No way, that's definitely a staged attack, like both sides shooting one another for the sake of covering another crime. You said they were near a jewelry store?"

Shona nodded. "Yes."

"So they were probably shooting in order to distract the cops from the robbing of the jewelry store. Is there more to that article?"

"Lemme scroll down- yes there is. You were right on that too, because that store didn't have no average jewelry. Once they dipped, the inside of the store was completely disheveled. Almost $1,200,000 worth of jewelry was stolen." The group collectively uttered a mix of groans, 'Damn's and 'What the fuck's. Kiran raised a finger. "And get this; they even stole the _security cameras_."

"Why?" Vivian's eyes narrowed in confusion.

"Does it look like I know?" Kiran shrugged. "It could be set up."

"The thing is though; why would they shoot their _own_ people in order to rob a single jewelry store?" Jay raised a very important question. "It wouldn't make sense to kill off your own goons though."

"That is true… so friggin' weird." Adrian shook his head. "These black van people legitimately be doing crimes the _craziest fucking ways_."

Vivian raised his glass. "They're all organized too, dude. That's what it looks like. And there's too many of them to be throttled that easily."

"We got the damn post-Yakuza-esque crime syndicate running rampant right now." James served himself another glass of beer.

"But the Yakuza did almost everything underground." Jay shifted in his seat. "They wouldn't run around getting caught by cops left and right like these guys. These people are growing at a faster rate than them getting arrested, it's just strange."

Shona shook his head. "It's… it's horrible."

Lexi placed her glass down. "I hope they all, whatever syndicate their in, get arrested at some point." She sighed. "We gotta get on a lighter topic, I hate dwelling on things like this."

"Well umm… there's a fashion show happening next week." Vivian looked at his model friend.

"OHHH right! Girl, I'm going." Kiran raised her hand. "I'll be seeing you slay the runway like you always do."

"I can't go, I go producer shit to do." Adrian said dejectedly, followed by Jay agreeing as well.

James shook his head. "Me neither. A game is on the way and I gotta be with my team."

"I might go, if I'm free." Shona raised his finger, and Lexi smiled at him because she still think that he's super cute.

"Aww, us four riding together. I honestly can't wait to wear your stuff again, that's the only part I like about those runway shows."

Vivian, being a sudden asshole, decided to bring up a glaring fact. "You do realize that you're all not modeling for my clothes, right?"

"Y-...wait, we're not?" Lexi looked confused. "Then who are we wearing?"

"Ambrose's."

This made everyone, literally _everyone_ , go 'WHAT?' at the same time.

Lexi shook her head. "Don't fuck with me."

Vivian chuckled. "I'm not, I was _just_ as surprised too. That's a _huge_ fucking market and most models there are usually the ones that are on every single commercial."

Lexi looked down. "Well, great way to fuck up my confidence."

Vivian shook his head. "Bitch, that didn't really fuck up your confidence."

"I know, I know." She smiled sheepishly. "But… I'm a part of that… holy shit..."

"I'm proud of you, babe." Jay gave her a kiss on the cheek. "You have evolved past every clothing line possible."

Vivian snapped his finger, concurring with the Asian male. "Besides, his clothing is made for all body types, so not only skinny bitches get a leeway for any of that shit."

Lexi glared at him. "Vivi!"

"Look, is that _not_ prevalent nowadays?" He shrugged.

"He's not _wrong_." Jay filled his glass back up. "Real quick, you guys wanna play pool?"

The bar had pool tables in the second floor. The group agreed on behalf of it and decided to make their way up the second floor to play pool. Setting up their table, Lexi and Vivian both still had that lingering anticipation of the event they would both attend next week, especially the model herself. The brown haired woman smiled; this was a _great_ milestone for her seven-year career.

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The Kaioshin stirred in his bed, eyes closed and sliding his arms underneath his pillows. The room was well-conditioned; it was still cool in contrast to the warm weather outside thanks to the air conditioner. The blanket the Kaioshin was underneath was fuzzy and warm enough to retain heat, although he was only halfway covered with it at this point, everything from his hips down was covered by the blanket, and his forearms were underneath the pillow on his head. Zamasu's torso was fully exposed to the breezy room all the way down to the v-line of his naval area, some light flyaways of his sprawled mohawk blowing slightly.

The doctor had called Zamasu at least four times wondering how the heck he wasn't able to hear her. Rebecca sighed, walking upstairs and making her way through the red and white corridors. Sure, her house was big, but the man had _bigger_ ears.

She giggled at the stupid thought.

Okay, truthfully she kind of needed Zamasu for something, something that was kind of heavy, per say. Rebecca needed help moving pergolas in her backyard, because the entire thing was relatively mobile, the chairs, the table and the canopy were able movable to different parts of her backyard. One problem was that Rebecca wasn't the strongest female truthfully, the doctor was sort of wimpy compared to her close female counterparts and she couldn't move an entire pergola on her own. It's a good thing that Zamasu was here in her home because now she could get some help moving heavy things around in her house instead of using Loki, who could only pull heavy things and not push them.

The problem right now is that he was not responding when she called him, so she thought that he was still in the bathtub somehow, although that would be kind of stupid to assume because she was certain he didn't like baths _that_ much. Besides, the water would get cold within a full hour if he didn't have the jets on and she didn't turn those things on. Next could be that he wouldn't be able to hear her from the kitchen, but that was ruled out pretty quickly. She finally reached his room door and knocked, not hearing anything in response. She then opened the door slowly, seeing no one sitting or standing in sight. His bed had white curtains over it which covered the bottom and front of the bed so she couldn't directly see anything on the bed other than his usual gi on the side of the bed. Rebecca kissed her teeth and approached the bed on the side of where the bathroom was and since it's door was open, she glanced inside only seeing that he wasn't there and turned back to where his clothes were-

Only to see the same Kaioshin she was looking for completely shirtless on his large comfy bed. His lips were slightly parted, his eyes were closed and he looks so peaceful sleeping, but it was weird because isn't sleep not a necessity for gods? She caught sight of how he looked, toned arms upward resting on his pillows, chest rising and falling and his abs and very upper groin exposed.

A really inappropriate blush came over Rebecca's cheeks, she was even slowly walking towards him as if this was some magnificent sight to behold. Well… it technically _was_ , but- _No, I came here because I need his help_. It was already getting dark out and the red-haired woman didn't like her pergola sitting in the position it's in now. She was nitpicky, and she truly was wondering whether or not if she should wake up the Kaioshin or not.

How is he even sleeping? Gods can _sleep_? This was new and in her case perturbing, especially if the heat in her cheeks just didn't seem to go away- _why the fuck won't it go away?_ Rebecca started to smell peppermint even though she was standing next to his bed and... _fuck_ ; the doctor had a lot of weaknesses when it came down to males, and one of them is if they smell like peppermints. She didn't know why, but that scent on dudes is something to die for.

And it's even worse because his stupid v-line gave a _high-key teasing_ exposure to Zamasu's hips.

She sat on the bed, if she hadn't been exposed to _this_ , she probably would have ripped the sheets off of him just to fuck with him. But judging from the fact that his gi was laying neatly on his bed, there was a 50/50 chance that he was completely nude and pulling his blanket off of him would… probably make her just as vibrantly red as her hair. So her finger hesitantly went towards tapping the god on his shoulder instead of staring at him like some idiot schoolgirl, and she calmly said his name as she tapped him. He seemed not to budge, so she gently shook him while saying his name a bit louder, but not obnoxiously loud.

"Zamasu…"

He finally responded, slowly opening his grey eyes, automatically realizing that he had just _slept_. Since when has he taken the time out of his life to just sleep? Gods would do this kind of thing out of conscious decision, and it wasn't like Zamasu was tired or anything. He just kind of… did it, he guessed. He blinked, and frowned realizing that a part of his shoulder was a bit warm, and he looked down at the feminine hand and trailed his eyes up to the owner of said hand. "Hello?"

It was at that moment when the feeling of cool breeze against his torso finally dawned on him, and he looked down to see himself completely unclothed. Well, minus the towel that he was wearing during his slumber, which probably unraveled while he was sleeping but he didn't feel like checking that right now because Rebecca was in his room-

His eyes went wide. Rebecca, a human woman who had allotted him this large luxurious room, was sitting right next to him on his bed while he was mostly naked and covered hips down, on the _first day_ of him being here.

He shot up, already pulling the covers up to his chin as if it would rectify all that Rebecca had been exposed to. "What-… what do you want?"

Even though Rebecca's cheeks were still rosy, she started to giggle. "That's not gonna help anything you know."

He ignored her statement, and the cute blush in her face although he didn't think it was cute. "Answer my question."

"Umm…" Rebecca became super shy, scratching the back of her head. "Uhh…"

He got frustrated and dropped his hands from where his chin was, letting the blanket fall down because he was just about ready to shake her out of whatever daze she post-appeared to be in. " _Spit it out_."

"I kinda need your help?" She still had that rosy look on her face, and it was bothering the Kaioshin greatly.

"Stop blushing."

"What?"

He repeated himself. "Stop blushing."

"I'm not blushing… what are you talk about?" Perhaps Rebecca had gotten accustomed to the heat on her face, because she truly was blushing right in front of him.

Or she was lying to herself at the moment and trying to work with it, but the Kaioshin shook his head. "Okay, _fine_ then; what do you need help with?"

She rubbed her upper arm. "I have to move something that's a little too heavy… and I can't do it myself."

The Kaioshin frowned in a weird way, in an _amused_ way. He looked up and down at the oversized shirt-clad female before him, and then he snorted. "And you need me to move it for you?"

Rebecca narrowed her eyes. "Listen, you try moving a pergola across a backyard! It's not as easy as it looks."

"Moving a _what_ across a backyard?"

She completely forgot about Zamasu's lack of knowledge in a lot of things. "Just… just come with me." She stood up and looked back at the shirtless man, accidentally looking him up and down. "And… put your sweater and stuff on."

Zamasu looked super offended, not because she was _looking_ at him, but because… "That is called a _gi_!"

"Okay, your _gi_. Please, put it on." She turned around and fast-walked as though she was trying to hide something, which probably was her face of course. Didn't she say that him trying to cover up his body wasn't going to help anything?

So a witty part of him came out, why would she say that and then walk so briskly away from him? " _That is not going to help anything, you know_."

Rebecca glared at him. "Don't use my words against me!"

"I'll do what I please." He smirked, and reached for his gi on the side of his bed. "I will assist you on moving something that you can't seem to move on your own."

 _He's being a tiny bit of an asshole all of the sudden_. "Just… just change dammit, I'll wait outside." She exited the room, and right after the door closed Rebecca made an obvious vow not to think about what she saw. Not even that, but she half expected to kick her out of the room since he was very nitpicky when it came to people seeing him like that. Instead he did get frustrated, but he still held a conversation with her while his upper body was still exposed to her. Maybe he really is letting go, at least a little bit.

His door opened, out stepped the Kaioshin fully clothed, and smelling like peppermints and looking sort of peeved off at the fact that Rebecca saw him the way he was. They both silently traversed the hallway, with Rebecca walking in front of him while he had his hands clasped behind his back. It was at this time she gathered the courage to start some more dialogue. "You know, this is your first day here, and finding you naked on one of my beds was not what I'd expect from you."

She made it sound like he was some child who did something that his mother was shocked enough to question its existence. He had no words for her, because he kind didn't plan out on sleeping shirtless, nor did he plan on sleeping in general, it just kind of… happened. Rebecca spoke again, "So how was it?"

The Kaioshin looked at the back of her head. "It was okay."

" _Just_ okay?" She looked back at him. "You were in it deep, dude."

"It could have been better if you didn't wake me up." He crossed his arms.

They reached the final step, Rebecca going to the part of the kitchen where one could enter the backyard through a pair of white French doors. "I just _need_ you real quick for something. Come here."

The Kaioshin followed suit, realizing that he hadn't seen Ollie or Loki at all since he had woken up. Now that he thought about it, it would be more probable of Ollie waking him up by licking his face again rather than a redheaded woman with formerly red-tinted cheeks, but probability doesn't work for him, he reckoned. Zamasu stepped outside, a bit shocked that it was only dusk and realized he slept for mere hours, which for gods is a _minute_ amount of time. If a god were to sleep they would be out for a week at least, and for eons at most. He stopped when Rebecca raised her arms to the pergola in front of him and smiled.

"I need help moving this giant thing, all of it, over there." She pointed to where the large patio in front of her kitchen was, since the pergola itself was a few dozen feet away from it. Rebecca sheepishly smiled, thinking that this was a bit of a strenuous task for him. "I hope it's not too much."

Zamasu blinked at her, raised a hand barely above his chest area and the entire pergola- tables, chairs, mat, _everything-_ was lifted up and off the ground by a couple feet. He moved his hand and the entire structured moved with it and he turned to move it onto Rebecca's backyard patio. Without any kind of strain, Zamasu slowly lowered his hand, allowing the entire pergola to return to the ground once more, and then he looked at her speechless, shocked face.

"Done." He strolled towards the opened door, and Rebecca stopped him.

"How many powers do you friggin' _have_?"

"A few." The Kaioshin found her giant curious eyes a little amusing. "May I go back in now?"

"Yeah... sure." She rubbed her arm again and then opened her door and allowed him in first. "T-thanks." The door closed softly, and she walked into the kitchen. "What are you gonna do now? Go back to sleep?"

"A god cannot sleep once he has been awaken." He sat down on her couch, crossing his legs with a poised posture. "It's very difficult to do so."

"Ohhh. Well, I figured. It's kinda the same with me." The doctor was no longer in his sight, so she spoke a little louder for him to hear even if she didn't really need to. "If someone or something wakes me up, I can't sleep after that. I'm a light sleeper."

A part of him took note of that for later use, in case she decided to really bother him again. "Humans in general have lighter sleep compared to us. One could blow up a planet and we probably wouldn't notice."

There was a pause, and then Rebecca's head peeked out from the kitchen to look at him. "A _planet_?"

He nodded. "Our hearing may be sensitive but we wouldn't really pick that up because we'd be in a deep sleep, anyway. And usually, gods would sleep for years."

Rebecca's brows raised. _Imagine being able to do that.._. "Gee, you guys are living the life up there."

A pause. That made him chuckle. "I suppose." He glanced over at the small bedding that belonged to the pug. "Where's Ollie and Loki?"

"They're upstairs, probably scheming something again. Those two…" She exited the kitchen with a fruit bowl, shaking her head. She sat down right next to Zamasu and the Kaioshin kind of leaned the other way because he wasn't used to close proximity. "They've become more than just brothers. They're like… partners in crime now."

The only exposure he had to Loki was when he met him a couple months ago, and even then the dog was super shy and quiet standing next to Rebecca. If it weren't for his past, Zamasu would have thought that his imposing size wouldn't make him so timid. She held out the fruit bowl to him. "You want one?"

He knew he didn't need to associate Earthling fruits with Kaiju fruits at all but it was still weird to think about eating them. He frowned down at the bowl. "Uhhh…"

"C'mon…" She did a circular motion in with it in front of him. "There's _mangoes_ in there."

Zamasu blinked. "I've never tasted that."

"Here's your _chaaaaance_." Her arms were outstretched with the bowl in her hands. "I don't think the apple trees in your homeworld place resemble our at all, do they? If they do then I would feel really bad."

"You would feel bad?" It was more of a statement than a question.

"Yeah because…" she was looking down and smiling abashedly. "It's like I'm eating your great-great-great-grandcousins or something." Zamasu loudly facepalmed, and that made her giggle. "No, seriously, it would be weird if you kinda…"

His hand went down to his cheeks and covered his mouth as he looked forward. "Rebecca…"

"Hmm?"

The Kaioshin inhaled. "I thought… that you would be a little _more intelligent_ than most."

"Well, isn't that why you didn't want to eat them?"

"No." He shook his head. "The Shinjin are an entire species; we're not a brotherhood."

" _Okay_... so just try one then." Rebecca picked up a grape with a separate fork and held it out to him. He slowly took the fork out of her hand and looked away while it entered his mouth and he chewed. The first thing he was introduced to was the amount of _juice_ hidden in this little grape, and the sweet yet sour flavor of the fruit itself.

He looked down at the fork. "Oh…" It wasn't _that_ bad.

"See? It tastes nice, doesn't it?" She took his fork and took a piece of a mango. "Want another?"

He started to become considerate. "Isn't this yours? Why are you feeding me?"

Rebecca pointed at the bowl. "You see how big this bowl is? I'm tiny, I served myself a little too much, I need help finishing it."

He took the fork back and ate the mango. He was slowly starting to like the taste of Earthling fruits, so he took one more on his own. He then took another, and another, and another, and ano-

"Listen I said I needed help! At this rate you're gonna finish the bowl on your own!" She exclaimed.

He looked at her, grey eyes into green, and smirked. "I am helping you. I'm being _efficient_."

"A little _too_ efficient." She flicked his arm again, making the green man glare at her.

"Didn't we have this conversation before? About the flicking?" He ate a slice of a watermelon.

"Well yea, but you gave me a smart response so… that was my rebuttal." She started doing this frustrating thing where whenever Zamasu picked up a fruit with his fork, she'd slide it off with her fork. "You know what? I don't need anymore help."

"Yes you do." He went for another, and she slid it off again. "Are you serious?"

"I figured you wouldn't want to help me that much, Zee-Zee." She snorted.

Zamasu stopped and frowned. "If I hear you calling me a stupid nickname as well, I will-"

"You will _what_?" She got in his face with a smirk. "What are you gonna do? You won't do anything to me?"

He narrowed his eyes. "I could do _a lot_ of things to you."

Rebecca's eyes narrowed in a weird, spoony way. " _Oooh, kinky_ …"

He was about to say something else, but what she said completely threw his whole train of responses off. "...Wait, what?" Then it fully registered within him. "WHA-NO, _NO_ THAT'S NOT WHAT I-" He took a giant ass breath because now he was getting irritated from being purposely misconstrued.

"I'm just _joking_ , geez." She giggled, taking in how flustered he was. "You're not the one who walked into a room and caught someone naked on a bed."

Unfortunately, however, Zamasu's mind instantly recalled his accidental mind reading in the car earlier. He may have been half exposed, but he had a horridly good glimpse of what she looked like- "Do not bring that up."

He was saying that both to her and mostly himself for that matter. "Fine, fine, I won't. I didn't know you'd be comfortable sleeping like that."

Zamasu technically didn't know either. "Well… I suppose." He had nothing else to say. He heard a door cracking open upstairs, followed by scattered sound of footsteps, or _pawsteps_ in this scenario, which traveled down the steps revealing a red ball, one small dog, and one really big dog running down the stairs both barking at each other. The ball traveled down the stairs faster than both Ollie and Loki, and bounced into the living room, rolling towards the unopened fireplace. The two dogs tried to outrace each other although due to Ollie's headstart, and Loki's height, both dogs made it at the same time and were pawing it to get it away from one another.

"Loki!" Rebecca crossed her arms, and the malamute looked at his owner. "Are you gonna say 'hi' to Zamasu?" Loki looked at the green Kaioshin that sat next to his owner, and he yapped quietly. Rebecca turned to Zamasu. "He's not used to you. It will take time to earn his trust. Come 'ere, boy."

She started cooing at him and he approached his owner, resting his muzzle against her thigh and she rubbed his head, emitting a satisfied growl from the malamute. He did that thing dogs do where they'd blink real slowly multiple times when their comfortable. A ghost of a smile appeared on Zamasu's face, and even though Loki was looking at him the malamute made no advances towards the Kaioshin. Rebecca looked between the two and shook her head. "You both are awkward, how is this bridge going to be built?"

Ollie jumped onto Zamasu's lap again, standing on his hind legs and placing his front paws on the Kaioshin's shoulders. They were now eye-to-eye at this point but Ollie had the red ball in his mouth and was looking at Loki. Rebecca still had the fruit bowl in her lap and Zamasu was low-key taking some fruits out of it, giving Ollie a blueberry every now and then. "I'm honestly starting to get tired, and I do have work tomorrow so- Zamasu!"

She realized that not only was he stealing fruits from her bowl after she said that he can't have any more, but he was now holding the entire bowl lounging back in his seat calmly eating a grape. He was mid-chewing when he innocently turned to her. "Hmm?"

"Give it back!" She reached for it, and Zamasu being the _hocus-pocus magic guy_ he is, holds it high in the air, and then starts floating in the air until his head was just inches away from the roof. The Kaioshin was floating several feet above her with the fruit bowl in his lap now, picking and eating fruits while looking down at her. Both Ollie and Loki barked at the sight because those two have never seen a floating green man eating a fruit bowl in their lives. The look on her face, a frown with her mouth slightly parted, said it all. "You gotta be fucking kidding me."

Zamasu smirked. "You said you were tired. Why don't you go to sleep and allow me to finish this in peace?"

Rebecca stood up and groaned. "Do you act like this with Irene?"

"Not at all." He forked a grape. "She's annoying."

The red haired woman crossed her arms. "And I'm _fun to annoy_?"

"You don't look annoyed."

It was true because she was smiling. Now the doctor just shook her head. "You're a jerk."

That made Zamasu lower himself, still sitting cross legged, but floating at her eye level. "Excuse you-"

He looked down to see Ollie standing on his hind legs and trying to pull Zamasu down. The Kaioshin raised an eyebrow and Rebecca giggled. "He probably thinks you're stuck in the air and he's trying to get you down."

The Kaioshin gave her a confused look. "What? Why would he think that?"

"I don't think the two ever seen someone casually floating about in my house, Mr. Magic." She remarked sarcastically, and flicked his arm again. "Fine. Go ahead and eat all of that, that's fine with me. I have to go sleep since I got work tomorrow, and I probably might not be back until tomorrow evening so… _Goodnight_." She turned around, gave her dogs individual kisses. Zamasu finally placed his feet on the ground, receiving intrigued looks from Ollie and Loki, and their owner made her way upstairs to finally sleep. Zamasu decided, that once he'd finish this bowl of fruits, he would take this time to quietly explore the mansion a little bit more… and maybe play around with the pug that happened to be putting his paws on his pants to catch his attention.

•◊•◊•◊•◊•◊•◊•◊•◊•◊•

Morning came by pretty quickly. Rebecca left sometime while the sun was nearing it's dawn, it was now around 9:30 in the morning. Zamasu was sitting in his comfortable bed with a book he managed to salvage after finding it underneath the living room coffee table. The entire night was truthfully peaceful; both Ollie and Loki fell asleep rather quickly, and that probably because the both of them had some sort of curfew embedded in them, but they both are definitely awake right now. Zamasu had left his room earlier to go downstairs and make tea, so his door wasn't completely shut which was surprising because he always shuts his door, you know, so no _cretins_ end up walking in his room.

That gave him time to ponder more about the red-haired woman, she had more of a quirky personality even though it could have been adopted from Irene's, but it was more… tolerable, in a sense. Perhaps that was because they both established a common ground, which makes Rebecca more likeable in his eyes. But one thing that he didn't understand was the fact that she was doctor, and she didn't like human beings; how could you spend your day-to-day life working with and on human beings when you don't like them? That was just weird.

There's a lot of things that was weird about her. Just from spending all that time in the airport showed him this to an extent, how she dismisses certain topics and changes her focus in a conversation so fast, she'd look sort of bipolar. Despite her very profound ability of actively controlling her thoughts, she does it to a point where even her thought process is somewhat neglectful of things that she wouldn't bring up. It intrigued him, the way her mind worked, and throughout the month he would inadvertently be trying to dissect this same mind.

Zamasu already could figure out that her contempt for humans even stretched beyond just that, seeping through to Irene's group of friends; even though he was told that they've known each other for a long time, he could blatantly see the disconnect between them. Maybe while he was asleep, she called them up to talk with them in all that time, but he highly doubted it with how she behaved when they left. It's ironic because Ollie exhibits the exact opposite actions; that pug was hanging with everybody _regardless_ , and ironically enough Rebecca didn't even _attempt_ to keep him away. She just allowed him to go to everyone; him, Jay, Adrian, Lexi, Ashley, Irene… even James at some points, Ollie was extroverted and sociable and his owner barely spoke with anyone else save for him, Zamasu and Lexi.

She was intriguing at best.

Over the course of the past thirty seconds, Zamasu heard the sound of something making soft contact with his door. Zamasu decided to step out of his room after spending two hours in his room either sitting, exploring the premise, staring at his sorcery-esque table or reading a book, and when he got closer he noticed a light brown eye blinking inside of his door, yet the being on the other side never made an attempt to open his door. The Kaioshin did it himself instead; he slowly opened his door fully, and was greeted with a shy Loki in front of him. "Hello there."

Loki blinked and took a few steps back. Zamasu did something kind of rare; he crouched down until he was near eye-level with Loki, and spoke calmly. "Why do you back away?"

Loki refused to make eye contact, but that was normal. Owners are the 'alpha' of a 'pack' - Loki wasn't an aggressive dog, that wasn't his behavior at all. Zamasu moved forward a little though Loki didn't move away from him, and he reached out to kind of pet Loki. The malamute kind of looked up, and he raised a front paw in uncertainty reaching up to Zamasu's arm and pulling it down from his head. Loki then started to approach Zamasu and he sniffed the Kaioshin, who still vaguely smelled like peppermints, and then he pulled away and sat down right in front of him. Zamasu got the cue; Loki did at least trust him.

The actual showboat of the three had exited his room and ran downstairs, and Zamasu looked back at the zooming pug. He stood up fully and went downstairs curiously, Loki running down and barking following his smaller partner, and since Zamasu did not understand their dog language he raised a brow. Once he reached the living room, he heard rummaging in the kitchen, and Ollie came into view with a bowl in his mouth. He placed it down and looked back when he saw Zamasu and approached him until he was a few feet from him and made a noise. The pug looked back at the kitchen and then at Zamasu, and the Kaioshin figured that this would be their feeding time, he entered the kitchen seeing Loki reaching for something on the counter.

Over night, he had the chance to walk around Rebecca's house out of curiosity, so he's seen the large kitchen before. The portion of the kitchen that didn't have all the appliances had wall windows with sliding doors, and the floor was white and tiled. The Kaioshin watched inquisitively as the malamute finally got down from the counter, and approached him with a small book in his mouth for Zamasu to take. Zamasu looked at this tiny book and realized it was a recipe book for homemade dog food. He assumed that the dogs wanted breakfast made from this particular book… by him. "Umm…"

How the heck was he supposed to do this? Zamasu had no problem skimming through it because a lot of the things there were pretty easy, but he didn't know where wall of these ingredients were. His concerns were answered by the nudging of Ollie towards the main countertop, the pug was encouraging him to pick one recipe to work with, and perhaps they'll both help him from there. Zamasu looked through the recipe book, quickly finding something that was relatively easy, and that happened to be simple doggie pancakes. He read over the ingredients: 2 eggs,

a cup of milk, half a tablespoon of coconut oil, a tablespoon of honey, a cup of whole wheat flour and half a cup of all purpose flour. At first, the dogs didn't do anything but once he started getting more and more of the ingredient out, they both started getting active with Loki going to one of the lower cabinets and Ollie trying to open the compartment where all the cups and spoons were. Zamasu helped him, allowing Ollie picked out the utensils which were connected by a ring while Loki was going for the standing mixer in the lower cabinet, and Ollie decided to help his fellow canine by getting the mixing bowl. Loki placed the mixer on the floor carefully and sort of pushed it towards Zamasu, of which the Kaioshin took and placed it on the countertop. He was about to say something until he turned around to see Ollie barking with the transparent bowl on his head.

"Hey, Ollie- stay still-" The pug kept dashing about in short bursts around the kitchen until Zamasu finally caught the bowl, which Ollie stopped and blinked, looking around. Zamasu chuckled, and decided to get on with what he was supposed to do, since both dogs weren't fishing him anything now. He kept the recipe book opened and propped against the wall and the countertop surface, mentally noting all that he was doing. He mixed all the liquid ingredients together and placed that on the side, making way for the flour to be placed into the mixing bowl. He poured the necessary amount of both flours in the bowl, low-key smiling at how both dogs were so eager to watch him make their breakfast.

Turning this _mixer thing_ on didn't come as second nature for him, so he didn't know how to turn it on at all. Loki moved over to the side where the mixer was, seeing Zamasu's confusion, and held his paw in front of a portion of the black mixer. Zamasu did that same thing and nearly jumped when all it did was enable a screen that he didn't know even see, _how did I get scared by that?_ The Kaioshin guessed that you'd have to tap the screen in order to get it to work. The recipe did say _mix_ , so he should press the 'mix' button… right? A quick tap with his finger, and the mixer started doing what it entailed; mixing the flour together.

He turned around to see Loki reaching for the bowl he used to measure the flour in. "It's just _flour_." He pulled the bowl away from the semi-patient malamute, and added in all the liquid ingredients that were in another bowl. It actually smells… quite good, for some reason, no wonder why both dogs were all up on him over this. The book said that it should be smooth and kind of runny, Zamasu looked at the contents in the bowl as they were mixed; what does smooth and _kind of_ runny even _mean_ in cooking terms? It's not like Zamasu's ever had a handle on this before, even when he was in Irene's house, for some reason he didn't think of adapting a multitude recipes for his own sake.

Well, that was partially a good thing; maybe the Kaioshin subconsciously knew that he'd end up finishing all of the food within a house in a _few days time_ if he was bestowed with that knowledge.

 _Okay, it looks smooth so… it's done, isn't it?_ He guessed correctly once he turned the mixer off and pulled the bowl from it, placing a spoon and pulling it back up just to see it drizzle back down aesthetically. The book said to spoon out the mix onto a heated lightly oiled griddle, and Zamasu frowned; now he had to use his extraordinary smarticles for this one. The picture in the book shows these pancakes to be disks, so he was guessing that a griddle had to be flat to achieve that look, and the pancakes themselves were smaller than the size of the plate they were on, Zamasu started looking in upper cabinets to find two suitable plates for the dogs. Just above the griddle was where all the plates and bowls were situated, so he pulled two identical ones out, eyeballed the size, and then looked down at the griddle. There was no wire attached to it, so he'd have to press a certain button in order for the to work, there was a small steel colored dial on the end of the griddle with numbers on it, he assumed those were the temperatures. It did say medium-low heat, so he went in between the middle number and the smallest number there.

He clasped his hands. "That was… pretty easy." Now all he had to do was wait until this thing got reasonably hot, and then he can place circles of the batter on it and- _wait a minute_... "Am I missing something?" Zamasu felt like there was something that he was missing, but at first he didn't know what it was until… "Uhh… OIL!" He raised a finger all dramatically and such, inwardly questioning why he even raised his voice in the first place. But that was not something to concern him at the moment; how was he supposed to oil a griddle? He kept searching around the kitchen, rapidly looking through every cabinet because if he didn't that griddle would get too hot. He frowned, there was no gr-

He felt Loki nudge his leg, and looked back to find the dog looking at where the griddle was. He followed the dog's gaze to see there was a spray can behind where the griddle was. He approached it, taking it in his hand and reading the spray can; it said coconut oil _cooking spray_. Does this count as oil? He sprayed it on his hand and felt his palm, _it feels like oil_.

Zamasu just realized that he literally just sprayed oil on his hand, and the can itself even said coconut _oil_ in big goldenrod letters. Both dogs blinked and tilted their heads both ways, and then barked at what Zamasu just did. The Kaioshin looked back at them. "Don't you two give me that look."

Okay, he had to do this lightly. Zamasu crouched down a little and gave the griddle's heated surface only a spritz of oil. _Is that enough?_ That doesn't look like enough, so he did it again, only rapidly moving his hand in one 'S' motion, spraying the griddle with a more liberal amount of cooking spray and then pulling back to see it already starting to react with the heat. Zamasu took the guess that the griddle was at the heat it needed to be, and he took the bowl and got a bigger spoon from a drawer. He started spooning in pancakes, eyeballing its size and making sure they didn't exceed their serving plates, and then he looked back at the book. It said to wait until the sides become a little browned and the middle starts to bubble. He turned back around to see both dogs becoming a little too eager and huddling around Zamasu and his handiwork.

"It isn't done yet, you two. Move back, I don't you burning yourself, Loki." A rare, _paternal_ side of the Kaioshin was emitted as he looked down at the ardent dogs; they resembled two little eager children. Rather, _well-behaved children_ , because the second he told them to wait, they both simmered down and started moving away from the griddle. The pancakes were starting to bubble in the middle and their edges were getting cooked.

This was where Zamasu's rapid efficiency started to kick in, since he was getting a kick out of how easy it is. He pulled out two spatulas, there were four pancakes now on the griddle; with the quickness, this green man flipped the both of them in a matter of less than a second which caught the attention of both dogs. He started moving like clockwork; the Kaioshin was flipping and serving pancakes like it was nothing, spinning the two spatulas in both hands and smiling while the dogs barked agog at the spectacle. Within a matter of a dozen minutes, all nine pancakes were finished and Zamasu turned off the stove and once again, still keeping that smoothness in his actions, took out another plate and placed the remaining three golden pancakes on it because he figured four pancakes each would be too much for both dogs, started topping the pancakes with blueberries and halved strawberries from the fridge, finish both bowls off with dabs of yogurt.

The Kaioshin, once finished, finally turned around with both plates in his hands and called out to the dogs who were now in the living room. "Ollie! Loki!"

Both dogs happily ran to where Zamasu was and saw their plates in his hands. Like the properly trained dogs they are, they stopped and sat in front of him, patiently waiting for him to set their plates down. "Here." He placed one in front of Loki and one in front of Ollie and once he rose again, they started eating happily. Zamasu crossed his arms, watch them move their plate as they ate, Ollie raising his head only to show that he had yogurt all around his mushy snout and was licking it off. The Kaioshin snorted and turned around to the three pancakes; to be truthful, like really truthful right now, these things smelled really tasty, and Zamasu was slightly tempted to take one and eat it-

 _Okay now_ , he scolded himself, _this is dog food. It's not human food-_ Why was he even categorizing himself right now? He _himself_ isn't even human, so technically he could eat whatever he wanted! But at the same time… _was it reasonable to eat dog food?_ He was heavily conflicted.

It doesn't even matter, he'll take one regardless anyway. It's not like it's poisonous to him or something ridiculous, so Zamasu did take one, and ate one, because _fuck the rules_.

Excuse the author's French.

And then he took another and ate that was well. Both dogs finally caught sight of the same person that made their pancakes now eating them, which greatly perplexed them; they've never seen their owner eating their food, it made them stop and sort of stare at him. Zamasu looked between the two and down at the half eaten pancake in his hand, and then he took the plate with the last pancake and fast-walked out of the kitchen without saying a word.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Zamasu's dad level - beyond calculation…**

 **By the way Zamayaki is actually based on the real life Yamazaki Whiskey, which is pretty damn expensive.**


	16. Vague Slip-Ins

**Let the shenanigans kind of begin...**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Vague Slip-ins**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

"Adrian…"

The sweet, suave voice of the Asian male filled the air conditioned room, it would generously grace the ears of the other man in the room warmly, except Adrian was asleep. He was sprawled out on his bed, his long curly hair was free and wildly spread out around his pillows and underneath his hands, arms and legs spanned out on the covered soft mattress, and his lips were slightly parted. Despite the very messy appearance of the sleeping music producer, his room in general was actually neat and clean compared to how it was yesterday.

And it wasn't because Jay did that for him. It definitely wasn't.

Jay's hair wasn't in his specialized 'messy samurai bun' right now, he decided to let it flow freely. He was wearing a high-low sweater that had really long sleeves which went down to his palms, and black compression pants because he was working out pretty early today. He approached his sleeping friend and sat down on the side of the bed to gently tap his chest a few times and call his name again. The man stirred in his sleep a little, shifting so that his face was now in full view of Jay and his hands went up to his bed board, but he completely wake up yet.

Another soft coo from Jay and Adrian frowned, barely opening his eyes and then closing them again, he was awake. Jay smiled at the producer before him, and then without warning, he started slapping Adrian in the face with a pillow he snatched from underneath his head.

The biracial male fully woke up in a start. "'Ey- what the f- dude!" Adrian looked around, and then made eye contact with Jay. Seeing a frowning, angry and twitchy Asian guy in front of you is not how you'd want to wake up. "Bruh, why'd you hit me? I was sleeping."

Jay threw the pillow back on the bed. "You know, I woke up today thinking that everything would be perfectly fine, and all vibes from the night before would seep into today." He placed his hands on his hips. "But I spent half of my morning cleaning up after all the shit _you and James've_ done yesterday! The living room and the kitchen were both a mess, and you know I don't like seeing that kind of shit in our house!"

Still half asleep, the logic that went through Adrian's mind basically concluded that since Jay already cleaned the mess, then there was nothing to worry about. "...But that… Is it clean now?" Jay reached for the pillow again and Adrian quickly retracted his statement. "Okay okay! I'm sorry, I'm sorry… my bad."

"You should fucking be. And oh-" Jay started chuckling but in a very angry way, and Adrian moved back on his bed. At this point, he could get punched in face out of nowhere by this man. " _That's not all_. No, what I said was just the _icing on the cake_ , to how pissed the fuck off I am."

"Uhh…" Adrian scratched his head. He couldn't remember doing anything else other than screwing up their living room and kitchen. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Bring your ass over here." Jay stood up, and when he noticed Adrian was still relatively confused, he reached for the side of his face and started pulling Adrian by the ear out of his room, ignoring all the wincing and the yelps the man made. They went through the hallway, downstairs, and over to a portion of the living room where the futuristic cupboard-esque shelves were. The entire living room was indeed clean, as though nothing happened yesterday, but Jay purposely did not clean up a certain broken antique that was on the shelves. It was scattered into a bunch of varying sized pieces, and was a transparent white color.

Adrian's ear was finally released. "What is that?" Jay pointed to the shattered item on the floor. "Do you know what that used to be?"

Jay knew the answer to that, and Adrian stopped looking confused when he saw it too. _Oh… shit_. "Uhh.. your antique thingy?" He earned a slap on his back, and Adrian vocally expressed his discomfort. "Fuck dude, you hit so freaking hard! My back hurts now."

"I don't care about your back." Adrian didn't make eye contact with Jay; he was utterly _furious_. "It's not just an antique, you nutsack. It's passed down from my father, and holds sentimental value to me. I've had that dragon statue for half of my life, it's already a rare find, and it costs a fucking fortune!" Jay moved to stand just close enough to see Adrian's face. "Don't you fucking frown at it, it's not some plaque you could toss around in a fucking room."

"I-I know that…" Adrian approached and knelt down to pick up some of the pieces. "How did it break?"

He was asking himself that question, but Jay heard it and that made his eye twitch. "It's made of _lalique_ , you idiot! Of course it would break from that height!"

"Listen…" Adrian turned back around to him. "I swear, _on my life_ , I didn't mean to break your dragon statue. Seriously, I didn't even notice that it was until you showed it to me just now." Is that how you apologize to someone? Even though Jay was shorter than him, he never failed to look as _horrifying_ as an angry wife would look to any dude. He raised his hands. "Please... don't hit me again, I'm sorry."

Jay took a few deep breaths, just to steady his nerves. The lalique statue was given to him by his father, who had it hand-made by _his_ father or Jay's grandfather, whom of which was a revered artisan a long time ago in Japan. Not only was it an extremely rare piece, but his grandfather made it specially for his son as a worthy gift of strength and power. He passed it down to Jay not after he had became a top tier black belt, but after his father figured out his son was, in his own words, 'wise with his strength'. As an important emblem of honor and _bodhi_ , Jay held that statue very close to his heart.

His friend may or may not have understood how deep this statue went, and how a simply apology wouldn't fix anything, but deep-down Jay knew that Adrian couldn't really do anything about it. So he did turn around and went to the closet where all the cleaning appliances were. He pulled out a broom and a sweeper, returning to the spot where his statue laid, and started silently sweeping it all up. Adrian slowly got up, because he was literally kneeling this whole time, and cautiously looked at his aggrieved friend.

This was a different kind of silent, the rarest one of them all. Usually when Jay goes silent on you, he's either going to yell at you some more, say something that would definitely get you in your feelings, or if he were in a heated fight he'd go silent if the person starts making advances towards him. _This_ wasn't any of those; this was that painful silence where Jay wouldn't talk to you for some time because he's disappointed in you and what you did, or he got so upset that he himself was at a loss for words. Adrian could tell that it was both scenarios in this case.

He couldn't recall if he accidentally hit it himself or if James did, either claim wouldn't have helped the situation. "Jay…"

His friend didn't respond, nor did he look up. Yup, he was too upset for words.

Adrian looked down at the ground, there was no use in trying to get Jay's attention when he's like this, but he felt bad. Jay's parents didn't live near him and he has a close relationship with the both of them, so anything they bestow to him is held with very high regard. Jay had finished sweeping up every last bit of the shattered pieces, and now he was going to where the garbage was. Adrian slowly made his way back upstairs, feeling undoubtedly horrible and certain that this silent treatment would go on for a day or more if he doesn't try to rectify it.

§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§s§

The evening came, Jay was now in the studio looking over some WIPs after making a preset for future use. He hadn't spent that long inside the room itself, though the temperature got considerably low because his door was closed, and the air conditioner was on. It was still summer, and even though he had a heap of electronics here the room still managed to retain more of a chill than usual.

 _Maybe_ , he thought, _it's because I haven't eaten since this morning._

It's true, he really hasn't taken in anything other than water in the several hours that went by since he had woke up, and that was because his mind was focused on what he was doing. And a part of it also had to do with him not having much of an appetite today, he didn't feel hungry at all which was surprising. The 26-year old man was still wearing the outfit he had on earlier, except his hair was now in a high ponytail with a more than enough flyaways that crowned his forehead. His head was tilted to the side, and he was sitting in a 'W' position with one arm propping him up on the space in between his thighs, and the other holding the glowing mouse underneath his hand.

Adrian went out sometime ago, he had tried speaking with him earlier but they only had small talk and that was just about it. Jay didn't like small talk either, so he pretty much cut it short, knowing his mood was still sour after what happened earlier today. One would think that he'd spend the night awake with Adrian and James, but the second he got home Jay took a quick shower and slam dunked himself onto his bed. Maybe if he wasn't so tired, he probably would have relocated that statue so it wouldn't have shattered into a myriad of pieces. That brought up another question; what the hell were the two of them doing that made them cause that much of a ruckus? Those two idiots must have been drinking again and having too much of a jolly time. His friend was normally a clean person; Jay had little of a problem with Adrian for that because he knew how to pick up after himself, but _sometimes_ , Adrian could be the laziest doorknob on the planet.

Yesterday was one of those times, unfortunately. Though Jay honesty couldn't get that upset at him because it's hard to stay upset at a longtime friend. The amount of times they got into heated arguments only to end up laughing like idiots in front of one another was countless. Though today they didn't argue at all, Jay assumed that Adrian had something to do and dismissed his departure as just that.

The front door was opened, and the only way Jay could indicate that was because of the blinking light that was posted on the wall adjacent to the sound proof insulation. He could imagine Adrian doing his little sporadic routine of putting whatever he has down, going upstairs to shower and change, and returning back downstairs to eat something. Sounds of footsteps were heard going up the upstairs and through the hallway, with a pause, and then they continued on. Jay placed his attention back on his track, tweaking and playing with the synths just to see if they'd fit the song.

After about ten minutes, Jay heard the sound of the knob turning and the studio door was cracked open. Jay turned around to see Adrian's head and shoulders peeking into the room.

His friend gave him a sheepish smirk. "Hey."

Jay blinked indifferently, both hands now on his lap. "Hi…"

Adrian stepped in, closing the door behind him. He had a brown black embossed bag in his hand from a bakery that Jay would go to oftentimes. Said bakery made customized cakes, cookies, and whatnot which are either pre-ordered or made to eat within the restaurant. His curly haired co-producer turned the computer seat next to Jay and sat down, swiveling back to face the Asian man. He looked down at the bag, and then held it out to Jay with both hands underneath it. "Here."

Jay cocked his head and frowned, but took the bag from him quietly and he looked inside to see a small white cake box. He pulled it out and set the bag to his side, seeing that this within this box was a sponge cake, which was Jay's all-time favorite type of cake, surrounded by five tinier equally spaced sponge cakes that looked like sushi. The middle cake was round, vanilla coated, and decorated with shredded chocolate and dark chocolate chopsticks crosses together, with big chocolatey letters on its surface that said 'I'm really, really sorry' in elegant cursive.

Jay was frowning, but he had a stupid smirk on his face, and it kept getting bigger as he continued to gaze at the box, opening and closing his mouth to say something only to find that he couldn't. Adrian clasped his hands together. "I dunno if you ate anything right before I came back, but umm… that's for you." His Asian friend was still doing that speechless thing, and he chuckled. "Am I forgiven?"

Jay looked up at him with a mixture of a frown and a smile now and he slightly shook his head, making his hair sway with him. "You fucking idiot..." he started to giggle. "This is extra as hell."

And it damned _was_ ; to make something like this required a lot of time, so that means that Adrian had left the house and went _directly_ to that bakery just to make this for him, did whatever he wanted to do, and returned to that spot to get the cake. That was a dorky action, even the smile on Adrian's face was dorky. "Well, I figured that since I've soured your mood this morning and you haven't had one of these in a while, I thought of _sweetening_ up your day with one."

Oh geez, _not again with this_. "Don't make shitty puns. That wasn't funny."

Adrian crossed. "It wasn't?"

Jay shook his head, still smiling. "No."

"Then why are you smiling?"

Jay looked down and then looked back up at Adrian, flailing his arms. "Because this is the dorkiest thing you've done all month!"

Adrian scoffed. "It wasn't that dorky. It's just a _pinch_ of dorkiness." He then shrugged nonchalantly and leaned back. "You're my roommate, you've spent years living with me. You know how I am."

"Ugh…" Jay gave him a look, unable to retain any anger towards him at all. And Adrian reached out and placed the box on the desk.

"I didn't get a definite answer as to whether or not you forgave me."

Jay slowly wheeled his chair from side to side, he does that a lot when something makes him bashful. "You already know that I do, you piece of shit." He gave Adrian's arm a stupid punch, and his friend chuckled.

 _This_ is why their girlfriends, and Irene, low-key shipped them so much. Even though the two weren't aware of it, they had an extensive bromance that goes beyond daps and brugs. No, not that these two do anything more than that, it's just that one of them does something stupid, and has the most creative way to make up for it. We all know who that person is at this point.

"Enjoy." Adrian stood up, and made his way to the door. "And don't spend 75 million years in here making a song." Jay's look was enough of an answer for him, and he closed the studio door.

Jay took out the clear fork that was in the bag and looked down at the cake, eyeing the words scripted onto it's sweet surface. He opened it completely, moved the chocolate chopsticks off the cakes top and shook his head. _What an idiot..._

She would have been home within fifteen minutes, but Rebecca had to return back to the hospital simply because she thought she'd forgotten her purse, only to find that it was sitting on her passenger seat. The red haired sighed dejectedly at her blunder.

"So you mean to tell me that it was next to you the whole time…"

Yup, she even brought out Terry to help her look for it, and he was on a supper break at this time. Rebecca facepalmed and shook her head. "Listen… it happens to all of us."

"But you were _driving_." Terry frowned, dark brown eyebrows knitted together which shrunk his Asian eyes. "With it _next to you_. How'd you not notice?"

"I _dunnoooooo_." Rebecca opened her car door again. "I'm so sorry for making you waste like ten minutes searching with me..."

"It's fine, really." Terry noticed that Rebecca had been really weirded out for obvious reasons ever since the vandalism. Even though she was relieved to see her purse, the woman was more than frantic looking for it. It was hard for her to contain it too, he could see the inner frustration in her eyes. "Hey…" he waved his hand in front of her because she was staring off into space slouching in her car. "You alright?"

Rebecca blinked. "Yeah- yeah, I'm okay. I'm just… thinking." Her car door was still open with Terry still standing outside. She looked down. "Have you been… looking at the news?"

"Well, yes." He nodded.

"Did you see what happened?"

He knew what she was talking about. "You mean the jewelry store shootout?"

"Yes." Rebecca started fidgeting with the button on her shirt. "That place was well guarded, too."

Terry knows Rebecca isn't outwardly paranoid, nor does she worry a lot, but she was making connections to things that weren't supposed to correlatively happen. "Rebecca, listen." He bent down to hold her shoulders, "You're in good hands, trust me. Nothing bad is gonna happen to you. What occurred before did not harm anyone within the hospital. Those people aren't going to touch us."

She nodded quietly. "I know that Terry, but I can't help it. We don't even know if the vandal who did that was a part of the whole black van thing, but I swear I've been seeing them more often, and they seem to be near my car whenever they are around." Rebecca finally voiced out the bottled-in frustration she kept within for an unreasonably long time. "It sounds stupid to see that they probably… know something about me because of… ugh, I'm making conspiracies up, geez."

"No no, what is it?" Terry leaned forward. "You can tell me."

"Well umm, two months ago on the same day of that intersection accident, I went to one of the patient's room to check their vials and administer another physician for them because I had to leave. It turns out that this same guy happens to be the brother of a man that was sent to jail because of a crime he did." Rebecca raised her arms up and down, and her hands slapped her thighs. "His name is Merkel. He still blames me for his brother's arrest."

Terry frowned. "Why would he blame you?"

"The guy used to abuse Loki, and when he was sent to jail I adopted him. Merkel somehow this that I had something to do with his actual conviction." The redhead looked down, pushing her hair to one side. "What's weird is that soon after that, we started seeing these black vans everywhere."

"So you're saying that Merkel has some sort of connection with them?" Terry ran a hand through his undercut hair. "I'm not one to agree with that; what if this guy was just some bluffy person?"

She chuckled at his wording. "Well…"

"Rebecca, I doubt that guy has any power over you. You got guards, you got lawyers, you have more than enough security at your disposal. He can't harm you, and he tries to, then _good fucking luck_ to him."

That was something she need to hear. Rebecca smiled, she could always count on Terry to make her feel alright. "Thanks, Ter'." She stood up out of her car to give him a hug. When she pulled away she giggled. "I've been so paranoid, I didn't even sort any of that stuff out. Thank you."

"Don't mention it." He snapped his finger and pointed at her, making her giggle at his charmful smile. "Now, I gotta lunch break to enjoy, just thirty minutes left. I gotta go now so I hope you enjoy your night. I'll see you tomorrow."

She closed her door and started up her car. "Aww, thank you so much. I hope you enjoy your lunch break, I'm sorry for thwarting a lot of it with my stupidity. See you tomorrow."

Terry was walking away turning back to look at her. "It's fine! Stay safe!" He waved at her as she pulled out of the parking lot. The sky was starting to get dark in the evening since it was the last month of summer, and the road today was a bit more busy in conjunction. Smiling at Terry's words, she decided to make light of her recent worries, perhaps buying something sweet to have before she'd return home. She took a right turn, driving through the vibrant portion of the city to go to a tea and coffeehouse shop. Rebecca got out of her car and entered the shop; it wasn't that big, but the place was very neat and cater-esque with a prominent woody theme. This same place sold varieties of tea, it's the same place that Irene goes to to buy her teas, and a lot of their drinks taste like friggin' heaven.

"Hello! What can I help you with?" She walked up to the cashier who gave her a sweet smile.

Rebecca gave the woman a smile back. "Hi! I'd like a medium black tea latte, heated."

"To stay or to go?"

"To go, please."

"Alright, that all?" She was punching the order into her screen.

"Yes." Rebecca nodded, and she looked around the place, seeing pictures and images of teas and coffees that looked aesthetic. A thought popped into her head, and it made her smile.

"Your total is $6.45." The woman looked at her.

"Actually…" Rebecca raised a finger. "I also want a large green matcha latte, to go also."

"Okay." She went through and added the order in. "Total is $14.90."

Rebecca pulled out her card and swiped her pay. She gave the woman her name, and the cashier gave her a nod. "Your drinks will be done in several minutes." She took the receipt and placed it on her serving counter where all the finished drinks were placed. Rebecca took a seat in one of the booths, pulling out and looking at her phone moving her red hair from her face. She was in her contacts, and her hands danced around a certain number, like they always do. Rebecca inwardly debated on tapping that contact, and having to wait until they pick up, and hoping that they do indeed pick up. Her mind said no, she had so much to say, she _felt_ that she had so much to say, so her thumb made contact with her screen and the person's caller ID was enlarged on the screen. She placed the bluetooth on her ear listening to the rings and tentatively counting them out. This time, the person answered within three rings.

"Hey." The male's calm voice was heard and Rebecca closed her eyes.

"Hi…" Rebecca rolled her thumb around her fingers. "I just got off work and stuff, and I'm in a tea shop." She paused, hearing sounds from his side. "How are you?"

"I was great." Jay was sitting in his living room watching a movie. The same sponge cake was near halfway finished, and he left his studio before eating it because he wanted to mindfully eat his gift.

"Was?" Rebecca raised a brow.

Jay nodded. "Mm-hmm."

"So now that I called you, you're not feeling great?" She tilted her head.

A pause, and a breath from the music producer on the other end. "I am eating something really delicious right now, I don't like talking while I eat."

"Oh." She kissed her teeth. "How come everytime I call you, you're always eating?"

"You haven't called me in a month."

"Well, whenever I manage to _catch_ you, you're always eating."

"I dunno, I like food." He shrugged. "Something wrong with that?"

"Well, not at all…" She trailed off, tracing circles on the polished wooden table.

"So," he shifted to sit in a more comfortable position. "Why'd you call me?"

Rebecca frowned. That was a question that he asked the last time, and it's also the same question that she was kind of asking herself. Deep-down, it's because she likes hearing his voice and having him talk to her, but she wouldn't admit that, it would conflict her. "I just wanna… talk to you, you know?"

"Hmm." He nodded. "Alright, go ahead. Talk."

It was obviously that he had nothing to say to her, but she purposely ignored that. "I've been thinking, maybe later on in the weekend I could take you guys out for pool- you know, the entire group together. You guys haven't played pool in a long time."

"We did that already."

"Huh?" Rebecca frowned. "When?"

"Yesterday night." Jay was twisting his fork next to the cake. "Me, my girlfriend, Adrian and his, and James played pool yesterday with a few others."

"Really?"

"Yup. It was just a night where we drank and had fun."

She nodded slowly. "And… you guys didn't invite me?" It sounded weird to ask such a question, but with what Jay told her, Lexi was there, and Lexi was a good friend of hers.

"Rebecca," she sat up when he said her name involuntarily. "It was late. You're a doctor. I don't think you'd like to drink before waking up early in the morning to go to work."

"How late was this?" Rebecca had to ask, because he could say that it was late, and it could have been at 5 in the evening.

"Like… 10 at night."

Never mind, that is late. She even fell asleep thirty minutes into that hour. "Oh…" She looked down. "But still I mean, I'd like to hang out with you all sometime over the week. Even though Irene isn't here, we could still come together and talk."

"No one said we _couldn't_." Jay laid it straight down for her, because he was hearing a bit of projecting on her side. "If you want to propose a plan, then you can talk with everyone else as well, and see if they'll be down for it. We always could chill regardless of Irene being here or not." He purposely left the subject of that sentence unanimous, because Jay knew it was obvious that of the four people he was with yesterday, only one of them was cool with her. Whether Rebecca thought that his use of 'we' was including her is up to her.

Rebecca nodded. "Alright… I thought it'd be a good idea."

Jay nodded. "I'm sure it could be." He was a _master_ with words. Geez, he knew how to gently toss shade at someone. "Well, I assume that's all then. I'm still hungry."

"Well… yeah." The red haired woman's hand went into a gentle fist. "I'll see you sometime. Goodbye."

"Oh, for fucks' sake." He dropped something that sounded like it was metallic, but he still considered her departure. "Goodbye."

The line went dead, and she looked down at her phone. _What did I have to say again?_ She could have sworn that she had things in her mind to talk to him about, but her brain went empty the second she heard his voice. She rigidly blamed it on Jay's stoic nature, his attitude and everything having to do with how he doesn't like her, that statement still stuck with her up until now. It isn't something to be shocked about at all, and for some reason Rebecca is slowly finding herself losing her 'guard' in a sense; the first indicative action being that she allowed James to drive her to Adrian and Jay's house. Usually, she stayed _far, far_ away from those two and whoever they know with the exception of the girls. Lexi was the only one who spoke with her because she didn't have any kind of story behind their relations, and Ashley obviously did not like her because of what she did, and repeatedly kept doing, to Adrian's friends years ago out of misplaced pettiness and _jealousy_.

Wholly, she wasn't jealous because of how Ashley and Adrian are with one another; it was loosely based on that, and mostly tethered to a myriad of things. What she saw through her rigorous training as a doctor and her medical prestige seemed to, in her eyes, _pale_ in comparison to what he had accomplished while she was in college. He didn't graduate college at all and managed to amass more than what she makes now, yet he hasn't lost that same funny, dorky nature of his that she loved, and then took advantage of years ago. Just seeing the only person who hadn't used her or taken advantage of her at all while she was ungrateful end up _not_ losing himself made her feel horrible at her own expense, triggering so many bottled thoughts, all of which used to explode out after they broke up and a certain incident occurred. Even though both events may have nothing to do with one another, her psychology made her force and tie strings to the unrelatable events.

That same change in overall thinking and her psyche latched itself into an unbreakable habit of putting two traumatic, uncorrelated events together. She couldn't help it; it fed her paranoid mindset even more, she even did the same thing with Merkel and the stupid black vans. She wouldn't have been this way if what happened back then didn't happen. Rebecca shook her head, she refused to dwell on such thoughts in a public place.

Her name was called, and she turned to see another worker within the tea shop place both of her teas in a disposable cup holder. She stood up and took the container in her hand, thanking the man and bidding him goodnight, and left the store. She got into her car and placed the holder on her passenger's seat, starting up her engine and driving off with no thoughts in her head. Her face was blank, mouth closed as she kept all attention on the road, refusing to continue her train of thought again.

That's another thing that she has a lot of; unfinished thought processes.

Rebecca took a deep breath to steady herself, and her green eyes glanced at the teas, particularly the green matcha, and a smile started growing on her face. The red haired woman was reminded of the green man that was in her house right now and how his reaction to the latte she bought for him would be. She imagined it to be comical as usual, the Kaioshin was low-key funny in a weird, dorky way.

This one random gospel song she hadn't heard of in years started playing in her head, one particular line specially saying 'if you think about God, everything will be fine'. She giggled, not knowing _where the fuck_ this random thought even came from, she isn't even religious and she doesn't attend church so…

 _Well, Zamasu's a god, and you're thinking about him right now, Rebecca._ And what was she doing right now? She was smiling.

Geez, this sounds cheesy as hell. Now that gospel song doesn't seem so random anymore, but it was still funnily ironic that it popped up in her head when she thought of Zamasu, _right after_ she was feeling down. Think about God, and everything will be fine… _Cheesy_.

Within twenty minutes she made it back home. Rebecca's mansion had a gate enclosure surrounding a large perimeter which would open if the license plate was recognizable via a quick scan. She waited for the gates to open which wasn't even that long, and drove in parking her car in the driveway of her house. Looking into her wallet, she walked to the door not paying attention to anything going on behind her. She reached her door and before she could put her key card in, the detector went off.

Her detector was both inside her house and out, and was also a little chip installed into a clip on her wallet. She frowned and turned around, seeing nothing that could possibly be unfamiliar, and she assumed Zamasu was in the house. It blinked soundlessly this time, which shows that whatever intruded was still in the vicinity of the detector, and since she couldn't see anything, her paranoia started catching up real quick. Her eyes caught movement in the trees outside of her mansion's fence and something was thrown into the driveway, and car lights were seen coming from the right side of the gate and judging by its gradual radiance, the car was moving relatively slow. She moved towards one of the pillars on her house and stood behind it involuntarily, waiting for the car to pass by, perhaps this was what set off the alarm. It would be weird though, because this car was outside and anything _inside_ the premise would set it off, so she stood there just to see the random car that would pass by.

What _did_ pass by wasn't no random car, however. It was two black vans, casually strolling _right in front_ of her mansion's gates.

She dropped her wallet and sunk to her knees and her hands went to her mouth, but stayed behind the pillar for a full minute after the vans had passed by. Rebecca deliberately got up slowly, and then looked at where the object that was thrown landed. It was a good twenty feet away from where she stood, and she approached it like it was some alien with an ape tail. Rebecca looked down at it and raised a brow; it was a small black box with a conundrum on it. She picked it up, studying the shiny box as well as the puzzle which required her to turn it in a certain way in order for the box to unlock.

"The heck is this?" She turned around, randomly reminded of her two lattes that she left in her car. There was too much going on in her head right now, and if she sat down to solve this thing, her lattes would get cold. Rebecca did this semi-jog to her car, taking out the container for them and her purse which she placed the box in. She went back to her entrance and picked her wallet up, quickly salvaging her key card and she finally placed it in.

Rebecca slowly opened her front door, introduced to her living to see her two canine children at first sitting on her sectional sofa playing on a tablet, but once she entered the house they both ran to her and gave her their attention. From what she could see, they were playing Whack-A-Mole. "I'm here! You guys had fun?" She rubbed both of their ears each. "Where's Zamasu? Do you guys know where Zamasu is?"

Even though she heard footsteps in the upper corridor of her house, Ollie ran upstairs to get the Kaioshin's attention. Rebecca went to the kitchen to put her things down, and within a few seconds, she heard Zamasu saying 'Okay' repeatedly and then an 'I'm going!'. Rebecca returned to the living room looking at the stairs, catching sight of Ollie biting Zamasu's pants again trying to pull him downstairs. Well, technically Ollie was hanging off of his pant leg and Zamasu was walking down on his own until he reached the actual living room's floor.

"Hello, Rebecca." He looked down at Ollie who finally released his grip on the Kaioshin's pants.

"Heyyy." Rebecca being a bit too homely, approached him and held her arms out to give him a hug. He stopped her right before she would. "Umm…"

"I don't embrace people, you know that already." Zamasu had his hands raised towards her, but Rebecca blinked at him and then shrugged.

"Don't knock until you _tryyy!_ " And then she embraced him. Zamasu made the loudest possible annoyed groan that she ever heard from him, and her smile got bigger. "Did ya miss me?"

"Now I don't." His arms were out in the air, he didn't hug her back because the Kaioshin is too awkward to exact a correct response. It's not his fault. "Can you let go of me?"

She looked up at him, her chin on his upper chest and cocked his neck back from the closeness. "So you _did_ miss me before?"

"If you do not release me," his hand went to her side, "I will hurt you."

"Zamasu, I'm not hurting you am I?" She let go of him but still had her hands on his upper arms. "I was just hugging you. Hugs aren't dangerous or anythin- _woah_ , your arms are friggin' toned." She started squeezing his biceps, and he took hold of her hands quickly.

"Don't squeeze me, either." Zamasu looked into her green eyes, which were widened and blinking.

"I'm sorry…" Rebecca looked down with that sheepish smile again. "I was just kinda hyped up to see you at the end of the day. I was worried."

He frowned. "Worried about what?"

"I dunno, you guys' safety or something, you know?" She turned around and went into the kitchen to put her teas in a decanter warmer so that Zamasu wouldn't drink the both of them while she'd shower. "I can't help it, even though I've been leaving and returning after long hours of work."

He walked to the opening of the kitchen and leaned on the wall, crossing his arms. Does he need to remind her _once again_? "You really think that anything could possibly hurt me? I already told you, I am a _God_. No humane threat could outmatch me."

She did kind of forget that. Then that gospel song started playing in her head again and she smirked. "Well, not you, but what about Ollie and Loki?"

" _You think that I would let anyone touch those two_?!" He even pointed at them, his voice was raised at her _preposterous_ question.

That indicated that within the span of more than twenty four hours, Zamasu would be willing to protect her dogs. That's so sweet, it touched her in a really rare place. " _Right_ ; you'd do anything to protect your buddies." She looked down with a really warm smile on her face; she puts the life of others ahead of hers because of three reasons; it's embedded in her as a doctor, she cares so much for her dogs and the people she cares about, and because a part of her didn't seem to exact that same value of life on her own. She couldn't help it. "What if… what if I was in danger, that would make my dogs worry and I do not wish that at all. Would you try to protect me?"

Instantly, Rebecca was internally adamant that he would say no immediately. But he was actually _considering_ her question and with every second that passed in his pondering, her mouth grew wider and wider. She _had_ to tell Irene this, the Kaioshin was slowly changing. He looked down at the ground, and then back at her, choosing his words because he felt weird answering this question the way he did. "I don't have to try."

The doctor was intelligent, and she almost emotionally took that sentence the wrong way. "Meaning you'd do it without any challenge?"

"Don't exaggerate my words." He closed his eyes and did that head turn thing that made him look dramatic, making Rebecca smile. The Kaioshin went to her stove and turn the dial on for one of the tops that had a kettle on it.

"Wait wait! I bought a drink for you, you don't have to make your tea." She held her hands out, and turned off the stove. "I have to take a shower first, by the time I finish, they'll both be nice and hot."

"You did?" _As she expected_ , he started looking around. "Why do I have to wait until you finish?"

"Umm…" Her hands were folded behind her back, left leg swinging back and forth and she casted her gaze downwards. "I wanna see what you think about it."

"That's not the real reason."

She also forgot that he was psychic. "Well, I kinda want… you to drink with me."

He frowned. Why is this woman so touchy all of the sudden? His hand ran through his white mohawk. "Umm… okay?" What the heck was he supposed to say? He could have looked all over and drank it without her, but that wouldn't be courteous.

"Alright. I'll go now, just to freshen up. Afterwards, i'll come back, and we both can sit in the living room and watch something, mm'kay?"

He blinked. "Watch something?"

"Mm-hmm. Like a movie or something." He was still frowning, and she straight faced. "You never watch a movie before, haven't you?"

He shook his head, and she sighed. "Okay, I'll put something good for you then." Rebecca took her purse and wallet, then tapped his shoulder as she left the kitchen and went upstairs. He looked back at her and shook his head; what is with her all of the sudden? He figured that she wouldn't be as much of a problem as Irene was, but in her case it was different. He thought she knew that he wasn't savvy with physical contact, but apparently Rebecca didn't seem to mind it at all.

It's not as bad as getting called a Lima Bean. He recalled Rebecca showing him what they looked like, he never hated an inanimate edible object in his life so much.

A part of him wanted to check around the kitchen to see where these beverages are, but he refrained from it and went into the living room and sat down on the sofa. The adjacent seats of the sectional had both Ollie and Loki continuing their game of Whack-A-Mole on the tablet and Zamasu sat in the large part of the sofa reading a book. Around ten minutes later, Rebecca came downstairs wearing a blue shirt and grey sweatpants.

She raised her arms slightly, and then went into the kitchen. "I'm back. Lemme get our teas."

That instantly got his attention. "Tea?"

Rebecca was in the kitchen at this point. "Yup. I bought tea for the both of us. Can you turn on the TV?"

He didn't know how to do that, but a more prevalent question was in his mind. "Why would you buy tea for me? I can already make my own."

"Oh no, it's special tea." The heck is she talking about? Within the kitchen, Rebecca pulled out both lattes from her warmer, and she went back into the living room to see Zamasu sitting up. She sat down right next to him and held out his tea latte, which was in a toasty brown coffee cup. "Here ya go."

He frowned. "That cup looks weird."

A giggle from her lips. "Zamasu, it's not in a legit teacup because then it would spill in my car. This is a coffee cup technically, here."

Zamasu took it from her, and looked at it. He then took a sip from the warm cup and his eyes went wide. "What… by Kami, kind of tea is _this_?"

She blinked. "It's a matcha latte." She looked down at hers. "Do you like it?"

"Do I like it? I-" He took another sip. "Did a human make this?"

 _I'll take that as a definitive yes_. "Uh-huh." Rebecca slid a compartment of her sofa rest open to turn on her TV.

Zamasu was still busy drinking and questioning the beverage before him, he shook his head. "I refuse to believe… that a _human_ had done _this_."

"Well, they had. Thank the barista at the shop I got that from." Rebecca smiled at the more-than-satisfied look on his face, and then placed her attention on her mounted TV. "I'm gonna try to find something that you might like, umm…"

She felt a tap on her shoulder from him, which was weird because usually Zamasu would call a name to get the person's attention. Any form of contact with a human would make him cringe, but he just tapped her shoulder. She looked over to see that the cup's cover was opened, revealing the opaque green latte inside. Then green eyes went over to the Kaioshin's face, which had a very cross look, and she blinked. "What?"

He looked down at the cup, and then slowly turned back to her. "Is there an underlying joke here?"

Rebecca blinked again. "Huh? What do you mean?" Apparently from what she could gather, Zamasu was green and his latte was green, therefore he somehow thought that she was trying to ridicule his skin color or something? "I don't get it. I bought that for you because I've tried it before and I thought you'd like it too."

That was literally all, but the Kaioshin had a very bad habit of overthinking things so he didn't believe her. "So you've went out of your way to find and bring me something edible that resembles my skin tone?" He _still_ continued taking a sip out of it, allowing it to sit in his mouth for him to fully grace the latte's taste. From that action only, he came up with an _ingenious_ conclusion for Rebecca's choice of tea for him. "Are you trying to say that I taste good?"

Instantly, Rebecca's eyes went wide and her mouth went open, gobsmacked. "Zamasu!" He was in the middle of a sip when she slapped his arm. He looked down at where she'd stricken him with a frown.

"You'd hit a god?" He was more surprised at how brave she was, rather than confused at why she reacted the way she did.

"Why would you say that!?" Rebecca still had that semi-appalled look on her face. "What type of books have you been _reading_? I know you haven't seen any damn movies."

"What are you talking about?" Zamasu placed the cover back on his cup and took another nice sip. "Gods are divine beings, do not equate us with food. Don't do what Irene does, because that's ugly and disrespectful."

 _Oh…_ Rebecca's face became more of an epiphanous gaze. She facepalmed the second time that night and muttered to herself "I took that statement in the wrongest way possible…"

"What?" The Kaioshin, instead of lambasting her for hitting him which he _ought to do later_ , was now giving her a confused look. "What other way is there to take what I said?"

Rebecca shook her head. "Zamasu, never _miiiiind_. You're innocent, you're innocent, just… continue drinking, please." She took a deep breath in, switching the subject up before he could interject. "So, what genres catch your eye the most?"

But of course, Zamasu wasn't letting her enact the stupid switcheroo thing she does all the time. _Not this day_. "No, no, no _no_! You better tell me what you thought I meant when I said what I said!"

"Why does it matter anymore? Just forget about it!" She was being frustratingly adamant and he did not like that at all. Before she could reach for her drink again, Zamasu placed his down and grabbed both of her shoulders, forcing her to turn and face him.

The God spoke with a tone so serious, that it made her freeze. "Tell me. _Now_."

Zamasu did that with the intention of making her confess, but a lot of weird things were going on in Rebecca's head at the moment he done what he did. The Kaioshin could see it in her eyes, that a _vast range_ of emotions overcame her within a couple of seconds, and her thoughts were running _too damn fast_ for him to coherently catch a reason why she looked at him weirdly. Yes, there was obvious fear involved because he was a freaking God; it's not common to have a god shake your shoulders to make you tell him what he ought to hear, but her fear had nothing to do with that fact. It was from something else that she was reminded of, and had once again repressed within two mere seconds. He let go of her shoulders, studying her face. She blinked, that weird fear was out of her eyes amazingly fast, and she looked down sheepishly.

"It was… inappropriate." She reached for her drink. "That's all I can say, I'd rather not ruin your thoughts with my misconstruing." And then the red haired woman leaned back casually. "I think I gotta dim the lights down in here, you know, to make what we're watching 'pop-out' a bit more." She made a quirky 'popping' gesture, and hopped up to go and dim down the lights.

Zamasu watched her get up, and then he looked down at the ground utterly perplexed. Rebecca went from giving him the most _traumatized_ look he had ever seen up close in his life, to switching back to her usual behavior _immediately_ right after. Like… Do humans act like that on a daily basis? How does a human manage to _switch off and on_ their emotions so easily? Is that what makes them blind enough to kill each other? Thought right now, he had managed to catch a bit more of a glimpse as to how her mind works…

And apparently, it looks like it short circuits very easily. How does putting your hands on someone's shoulders cause them to have such vague fragmented flashbacks? He couldn't even pick up what exactly she was thinking about when he did that.

Rebecca plopped back down on her seat and looked to the two dogs, snapping her fingers to get their attention. "You guys want some treats?" She looked back at Zamasu with a smile. "I ought to feed them something before we start." Her dogs happily obliged her to stand up and she did. "Meanwhile, just go through all the movies and see which ones you wanna watch."

The Kaioshin had so many questions buzzing through his head right now, but if he were to voice a single one then she'd probably avoid it like the plague, and this coming from what he had just seen. Maybe he ought to just let her actions and reactions speak for themselves instead. Zamasu decided that was the best idea as he scrolled through all these movies that looked like book covers to him. Is that what a movie is; just a filmed version of a book?

That sounded like a _painfully_ obvious question.

Well, they both tell stories, judging by their descriptions and imagery, so there is his answer. Zamasu never had a particular genre that he favorited out of everything else, he could never disparage against literature in any way. He loved all forms of literature in fact; some of them weren't as touching or as intense as others, but he knew that was in their nature and that was perfectly fine. There were a lot of things that the Kaioshin didn't disparage against; food, books, animals, he accepted them all regardless…

Zamasu had been reading books with titles that happened to be somewhat serious, but he just came across a certain movie that caught his eye, namely because of the title. He read its description and frowned. "What's a toaster?"

"Hnn?" Rebecca was left the kitchen. Presumably Ollie and Loki were busy eating in there, she sat down next to him and looked at what he had chosen. " _The Brave Little Toaster?_ " She looked at him. "That's what you wanna watch?"

"Uhh…" Zamasu raised a finger. "This movie only has to do with kitchen appliances." He shrugged at the screen. "Why would someone watch a movie about _kitchen appliances_?"

"Oh my gosh, I've seen this movie before dude." Rebecca shook her head. " _It's not what you think_ , but it's so good." She looked down. "It's… relatable."

"You can relate to a bunch of kitchen appliances?" Zamasu gave her a look, _what is she on?_

"No, that's-you know what? Why don't we watch it together, then? You'll see what I mean." She selected that particular movie and got into a more comfortable position. Zamasu crossed his arms, of course he had no idea what he could have wanted because he never seen a movie before, perhaps this… _weird_ movie would be interesting. A few minutes after the introducing credits came the beginning ten minute scenes of the movie, and Zamasu was already asking questions.

"Was that lamp _talking_? Why is it talking?"

"Why is it fighting a radio?"

"Did that toaster just unplug itself?"

"How could that blanket thing cry?"

"Since when do kitchen appliances do all of thi-"

"Zamasu!" Rebecca shot up to look at him. "It's a cartoon, for crying out loud. It's meant to _appear_ lighthearted and stuff." She started to explain to him what happened. "That was an electric blanket. He's crying because he missed the little boy in the picture."

"Why does he call him his master?" He frowned at her. "Doesn't that sound… demeaning?"

"Well, not to them. They're all dependent on the little boy because he plays with them."

Zamasu raised a brow. "They are dependent on a human boy…"

Rebecca knew that his eye would twitch. "Well, humans did make them, so they would call them masters. Just, just watch."

There was a particular scene right after that caught Zamasu's attention as he listened to the dialogue. The lamp, which happened to be called Lampy, the radio, Toaster, Kirby the vacuum, and the electric blanket were all in front of the air conditioner right after the electric blanket was crying.

" _Optimistic? Somebody untie the knot in this guy's cord?"_

 _Kirby: "Why don't you just shut of?"_

 _AC: "Hey I'm reaaal scared there, Kirby. What are you gonna do, suck me to death?" Kirby groaned in annoyance, while the air conditioner continued. "What is it with you guys, get this through your chrome. We've been dumped,_ _ **abandoned**_ _."_

 _The electric blanket looked down at the picture frame. "But… he loved us."_

" _So what, he's a kid, he has a family; they move away, he moves away. It's a package deal… He's not coming back, pure and simple."_

 _Kirby inquired. "Oh yeah? Did you talk to him recently? They could drive up any second."_

 _The desperate electric blanket got his hopes up. "You really think so?"_

 _This made the air conditioner scoff. "The whole bunch of you gotta have a combined wattage of 5, maybe less- it's been year, it's scrap-metal time."_

 _Toaster was still defiant. "Well, you can do what you like. We're not gonna give up hope."_

" _That's real touching, Toaster. You're gonna get me bawling like a baby anytime now."_

 _That was when Toaster raised his dial at him. "I think you're jealous!"_

" _Suuure, I'm jealous of a bunch of dimwits."_

 _Lampy's lightbulb turned on as he whipped his head towards the AC. "What?!"_

That elicited a tiny chuckle from Zamasu, because even though he can't understand sexual innuendos to save his life, he managed to comprehend that pun pretty quickly.

 _Toaster continued, adding fuel to the fire. "Yeah, because the master never played with you!"_

 _Kirby then came in. "Because you're stuck in the wall."_

 _Without warning, the AC turned itself on full blast, blowing all the characters away. He took a deep breath and gave them all a menacing look. "So… it's back to that stupid static again." He started getting riled up the more he spoke, the wind catching on with every statement. "Ya think I don't know what goes on in here? I know what goes on in this cottage… it's a conspiracy, and everyone of you low watts is in on it. Just because you can move around, ya think you're better than I am." His eyes started bugging out as his voice raised. "I'm not an invalid! I was designed to stick in a wall! I like being_ _ **stuck**_ _in this_ _ **stupid**_ _wall! I can help it if the kid was too short to reach my dials!"_

 _Toaster quickly realized that the AC was starting to malfunction as he came face to face with his own statements. "We didn't mean it! Really!"_

 _Steam started ejecting out of random places from the AC, then he started igniting. "_ _ **IT'S MY FUNCTION!**_ _"_

 _Toaster tried to retract his statement, and Kirby quickly ushered them away from the toaster and behind the sofa. "He's gonna blow!" They all went for cover, as the AC bugged out, still stuck in his position on the wall while he was slowly going to combust. With a final scream, he exploded, leaving large cracks against the wall and when the dust finally set, all the appliances came back out to see what wreckage the air conditioner became._

Zamasu's eyes have never been glued on to something so intently. He blinked at the dead air conditioner, and looked down at Rebecca. "You said… that this was lighthearted."

Rebecca looked at him, and gave him a knowing smile. "It's made for kids, because children can't really see past this kind of stuff, so they just see an air conditioner explode and think that it's fine." She looked back at the screen. "Even some adults can't either."

The Kaioshin literally just witnessed what happens to a person in an existential crisis. However, Rebecca noticed that his attention wasn't averted from the movie, in fact he was _fully invested_. Zamasu found it weird how these appliances could talk, but quickly noticed that this was no ordinary cartoon. There was an underlying pitiful connotation when they all thought the sun was a 'big lamp', they haven't seen the outside at all.

In fact, there were too many pitiful and depressing undertones in this movie, like them singing about life while they were traveling to find another home to live in, and find another _master_. Or how the electric blanket is emotionally clingy enough to try and snuggle with the others when they were lost in a forest. It made the Kaioshin question a lot of things though; due to his usual nature of reading books and reflecting on them a whole lot, the Kaioshin couldn't help but be reminded that this has _heavy_ ties with how humans act… and yet all of this was personified with the use of kitchen appliances.

At some point, Toaster ran away from a bunch of animals who were staring at their reflection through his shiny surface. He ran into a lone flower next to a tree that had a shed of light around it. There were no other flowers like it nearby, and when it saw its own reflection, the flower thought that it was a different flower. One that looked just like it, and it started embracing Toaster until he ran away. Once Toaster did however, he looked back to see that the flower had wilted, its petals losing its lively tethers, and falling to the ground.

Rebecca said that this was relatable? That opened up new avenues as to how she thought; just _what exactly_ was relatable about this? That flower was lonely, when it saw a reflection, it thought that there was another flower in front of it. When it found out that that was just a reflection, it had died out from loneliness. He can make a vague tie to that; Rebecca doesn't seem to talk a lot to her friends, and she's the only person he knew that shared his same sentiment over humans. Did she long for that understanding… just as much as he did?

That raised another question; why _did_ he long for that understanding? He knew what he saw, he knew humans were horrible, he'd known this for countless millennia, and he knew that Gowasu _knew_ this too. So why can't his mentor agree with him if the facts are that obvious? Zamasu knew he was right, he's the only one who openly admits such dialogue, and it becomes invalidated by Gowasu's claims of justice. Now you imagine having a narrative that no one else wants to agree with, and that leaves you being the only one who outwardly thinks different. You have no other choice, by nature, to feel somewhat _invalidated_ and have to explain yourself over and over, hoping others would understand where you came from. And it may be enticing to think that you're intelligent beyond your years, and that no one else can comprehend what you've done and seen, and that you wouldn't succumb to the inevitable feeling of painful eccentricity after denying it for so long.

Despite how ridiculous it may seem, Zamasu just realized that he related more with an air conditioner than he did with his own teacher.

"What is he doing?" Zamasu pointed at the screen seeing some fat human guy holding a blender. At this point, toaster and his friends were all stuck in some mans house. This man held a blender between two plates and turned a lever, which ended up squeezing the blender until it ruptured, the action made Zamasu raised both hands at the screen. "Is he destroying the appliances?!"

She could already see he was starting to get attached to the characters themselves, and not render them as inanimate objects although the movie shows they act like that in front of humans. "He takes old appliances apart and mix matches them or something to make new ones. He doesn't realized that he is technically mutilating them either."

Zamasu shook his head. "Ignorant humans… destroying their own patents for fun." He spat out his sentence in disgust, watching the appliances sing about being mutilated, and self-aware of what they look like.

"I mean they can't speak to the guy. They communicate with one another, humans don't understand them." Rebecca pointed at the screen while look at Zamasu in recognition. "I like that you picked that out. It's kind of the same thing that goes on with how humans treat animals sometimes."

"They abuse them?" That was more of a statement on Zamasu's part.

Rebecca nodded. "Some horrible people, like Loki's previous owner, get a kick out of hurting animals because they equate their inability to speak with stupidity, I guess. They don't take into account that animals are sentient beings too, and the same goes for people too."

"People?" He looked at her.

"Humans kill and hurt other humans without thinking about how it affects the other person." She shook her head and looked away from him. "And in a lot of cases, it affects themselves too. Those who murder end up becoming mentally scarred when they reflect on their actions."

Zamasu was repulsed, but to hear this from a human's point of view greatly conflicting a tiny part of him. That part was shut out by the fact that Rebecca and him see eye-to-eye, it will continue to get bigger and bigger as time passes.

The movie was nearing its end, Toaster and the others were in a junkyard now and they were watching all the other junk cars get crushed. These cars were singing about their final statement as to what they did to end up in a junkyard as well as what they had wished for before they'd get crushed and compressed into cubes, as there was ' _nothing they can do about it'_. One particular green car didn't wait for the magnet to lure him on the conveyor belt, he jumped right on and sung his woes. His final words were sung with the other cars, right before he was crushed; 'You're Worthless.'

Zamasu blinked, cocked his neck back, and then leaned forward. "...Did that car just commit suicide?"

"Yup." Rebecca looked at the Kaioshin who was staring at the screen. "Well, a car's function is only to drive, and it was called worthless. So it thought that since its only purpose is for driving, and it can't even fulfill its purpose, then what's the point of living?"

The Kaioshin took a deep breath, and looked down at the table. That statement hit him _deep,_ as it's the same question he asks himself for the sake of mortals and their existence. Why would the gods create such… mindless disappointments, bestowed in the image of gods themselves? It made no sense at all-

"Wait a minute…" Zamasu watched as Toaster looked on to see his friends clinging on to their master, who happened to stop by at the junkyard. The little boy was now a full grown man, and he happened to recognize all of his old appliances that were left forgotten at his old house. The giant magnet caught Toaster's friends, and the man tried to pull them off only to end up on the conveyor, and he couldn't get up and out because his arm was stuck on a car part. Before his hand was get crushed, Toaster jumped straight into the gears of the crusher.

"NO!" The Kaioshin yelled which made Rebecca jump in her seat, he leaned forward as he watched the Toaster get mangled by the gears. The crusher was indeed stopped right before it would compressed the man's hand, but at the expense of the toaster. "NO NO NO _NO_!"

She looked at him with shock, and then giggled while reaching out for him. "Zamasu, calm down! It's a cartoon toaster-"

"NO, THAT'S NOT _JUST_ A TOASTER!" He wiggled out of her grasp, and pointed at the screen while tapping the coffee table with every word he said. "THAT IS A SENTIENT BEING, AND HE JUST SACRIFICED HIMSELF!"

Rebecca pinched the bridge of her nose while a smile. _He really got into this, geez_. He looked so despaired. "He sacrificed himself for his friends…"

"Zamasu, he's not dead." Rebecca slightly shook him by his shoulder. "The movie hasn't ended yet."

"How could he do that?" Rebecca could imagine how utterly _shook_ Zamasu would have been if this whole was a descriptive book. He'd probably walk out of his room with the most conflicted expression on his face.

"He didn't want his friends and his masters to die." Rebecca sat up. "Sometimes, you gotta sacrifice something to save something else. That was the only way Toaster could kept them alive. He wouldn't have done this in the beginning of the story, he wasn't as nice as he ended up becoming now."

"Sacrificing your own life for the sake of others?" Zamasu frowned. "There is no way this movie is for kids."

"It _is_." Rebecca giggled. "But it's deeper meanings are covered, so that kids wouldn't see as much as we can."

He nodded slowly. Rebecca reckoned that she made a great choice in showing him this. The one thing she loved about watching movies is commentating on them, she can't help but talk about the movie as she's watching it. Zamasu started pointing at the screen again. "Wait… he's fixing him! And his friends are there!"

The human male that all of the old appliances admired was indeed fixing up the toaster, bringing him back to life. It turns out that this man decided to take all of Toaster's friends with him to college for his use, so they did indeed find their new master. Except, it was the same boy that they had grown to love. "He's alive!"

 _I swear, on everything, this by-the-thousands-year-old God in front of me is like a child_. She watched as he sat up, his face became a gradually growing smile, and then the movie finally came to a heartwarming, recollecting close. And then he frowned. "Wait, it's over?"

"Yup." Rebecca giggled. The credits were rolling, so she back out of the movie, and Zamasu reclined back into the couch looking at the floor somewhere. "What do you think?"

The Kaioshin shook his head, opening his mouth to say something and then closing it again. He did that a few times, until he finally construed the right words in his mouth. "I didn't...think that it would be like _that_."

"Told you." Rebecca turned off her TV, and flipped her hair. "Since you asked _who'd watch a movie about kitchen appliances_."

She made a mocking tone at him, and he glared at her. "Do not mock me." Rebecca giggled and tapped his nose. "Why did you just do that?"

"You really don't know how cute you are." She looked really coy, and Zamasu just frowned at her. Rebecca then let out an exhausted sigh. "Ugh, just take the freaking compliment. I called you cute!"

He grasped his biceps. "What is cute about me? I don't get it." The Kaioshin looked weirded out by the compliment.

"A lot of things are cute about you. C'mon, you can't be that oblivious." She stood up and told her dogs that it was bedtime for them.

Zamasu stood up, taking his empty latte cup in hand. "Just don't… do that again."

Red hair cascaded as she turned around. "Why not?"

"Because it's strange."

"No, it's not." Rebecca shook her head. "You're just not used to it. Ollie, Loki, time for bed, you guys."

He moved from the sofa, watching Loki and Ollie go upstairs, obeying their orders like they always do. Rebecca then turned to him. "I would order you to go to bed too, but you barely sleep exempting yesterday of course."

"Hmmph." He passed her and scoffed. "And if you did, I wouldn't have done so either way."

The doctor narrowed her eyes. "Mischief."

"Have I broken any rules yet?" He returned her gaze, and she walked over to him.

"You ought not to."

"Don't tempt me."

"I'm not." She shook her head, the woman was right in front of him. She had to look up in order to meet his eyes. "I have two more hours until I have to sleep. I'ma go upstairs and call a friend, you can go and stare at your infinity table unless you wanna stay in my room with me."

Well, that's different from Irene, who'd tell him not go in her room. Zamasu looked down. "I'll think about it." No he wouldn't, he'll spend the entire night watching movies and absorbing the content and information he's watching. He himself didn't know that at the moment.

"Okay then. I'll see ya." She was gonna tap his nose again, and he grabbed her hand. Rebecca's grey eyes widened at the green hand that was on her wrist. "Geez, your hands are big."

"They're not big." He shook his head. "You're just small."

She pouted at him and removed her hand from his grasp. "Shush." The doctor walked away and upstairs. She stopped halfway to look at him. "Goodnight." And then continued her trek upstairs.

The doctor figured that he'd probably return upstairs sometime later to his room, but didn't pay much attention to his whereabouts when she plopped onto her bed to call Irene. They had a long conversation, about half an hour regarding Irene's plane ride, her settling in a hotel in China and having more than one translator for every city and country she's going to and the amount of work she'll be doing, and also Rebecca's first day with Zamasu. Irene told her that Adrian called her later yesterday talking about pool and the game that he played with his group of famous friends, which was coincidental because that was the same plan that she wanted to enact with the others only to hear they've done it already. Irene said that when she asked Adrian why Rebecca wasn't there, the music producer said that it was well beyond her curfew to be drinking and playing pool being a doctor and all.

How cute.

And then she spoke with Lexi about random things. The two had many nights where they'd call each other, even when Lexi was sitting with Jay and her boyfriend wouldn't mind it at all. They spent an hour having many strings of conversations, going from their jobs, Lexi's fashion show next week, Jay, food, boob sizes… just random girl talk shit. After she had bid her goodbye and hung up, Rebecca lazily rolled under her blankets in the air conditioned room in a fetal position, and she quickly fell asleep.

¶•¶•¶•¶•¶•¶•¶•¶•¶•¶

Rebecca had woken up the next day, did her whole routine and put on her clothes. She looked at the time; it was 8:00 in the morning. The doctor tied her hair into a ponytail and grabbed her purse, and went downstairs only to see the Kaioshin sitting in her living room.

"Zamasu?"

He was watching a movie, again. He turned around to look at her. "Hmm?"

"Good morning? Umm… you've been watching movies all night?" She slowly continued her trek down the stairs, walking to stand in front of him.

"Perhaps."

Oh no, Rebecca frowned and shook her head. While he spoke, he did turn his head to her direction but didn't actually look back at her. He cannot be serious, it can't be possible that he literally sat in her living room watching movies all night. This whole act reminded her of how her little brother was. Even though he was close to a straight A student and got very good marks on his grades, the kid would play videogames for hours with no breaks whatsoever, and she'd always pop in his room to make him stop and take his mind off of it. Her 'instincts' kicked in and she went to stand right in front of the reclined Kaioshin.

He leaned to the side and she stepped sideways to block his way. Zamasu looked up at her. "Can you please move? I'm trying to see what will happen in this martial arts duel."

"Zamasu, you've been up just staring at this screen for hours." The red haired doctor place her hands on her hips. "Take a breath for an hour, or _several_."

"Alright, you know what. I would never do this but…" The Kaioshin raised his hand, telekinetically lifting Rebecca and putting her next to the stairs, ignoring her protest. But the woman wasn't going to let this die down; she went right back to her position and tried to back out of the action movie. Zamasu had to resort to moving her again, and since telekinetically moving her wouldn't work, he literally held her waist with one arm and picked her up over his shoulder.

"Zamasu, put me down! I thought you said you don't like human contact!"

"You left me no choice." He paused the movie, and walked over to open her front door. "I will throw you out of your own house if you continue to stand in my way."

"Are you _serious_? Okay fine, fine, I'll stay out of your way but…" He put her down, and Rebecca straighten out her shirt. She dropped her purse on the floor while he was sauntering to her door. "Please don't spend too much time glued to the TV, okay?"

"Why are you getting maternal with me?" The Kaioshin crossed his arms. "I know what I'm doing."

"I'm sure you do, I'm just reminding you. Can you pick that up?" She pointed to her wallet, and he telekinetically picked it up and handed it to her. "Is that a way to cover up for laziness?"

"I am the _least laziest person_ you've ever met."

A chuckle. "Alright then. I'll see you in the afternoon, though I better not find that you're still watching movies. Bye-bye." Just annoy him, she tapped his nose before he could catch her, and closed her door catching a glimpse of his glaring face. Rebecca went to her car and sat in the driver's seat, then felt at a weird bump in her purse. She opened it up to find that same black box that she placed in her purse yesterday, she even forgot about the whole black van thing from seeing the Kaioshin. Although it takes 20 minutes for her to get to the hospital, she didn't need to get there until 9 so she could spent the next 20 or so minutes trying to solve this thing. She twisted and turned the conundrum dial trying to solve it, and within ten minutes, she had it figured out. Even though it was a tiny box, that didn't exempt the difficulty of the puzzle. The black box clicked, and she opened it to see a small, well-folded dull-yellow lined piece of paper. Unfolding it completely, she ran her thumb through the letters which were in a rich, expensive looking black ink with the address of a random street, and a time which was 11:54. There was no date written or anything, just that address and that time.

Rebecca frowned, and realized there was another piece of paper within the box. She pulled that one out and this one had dark red lining, with the same rich black ink for the words on it which read:

 **He Can't Harm You**

 **But We Will**

She froze, a flurry of thoughts running through her head. She recalled what Terry said yesterday.

Terry told her that 'he', that Merkel, couldn't harm her.

This paper came from the black box that was thrown into her front yard through the gates, right before a black van passed by. How did they know of what she was talking about-

They were listening to her conversation. They overheard her speaking with Terry, they knew who she was and they _knew_ what her car and house looked like. Everything that Terry convinced her to be wrong happened to be right. She _was_ being targeted.

Rebecca shakily threw that box on her passengers seat and revved up the engine, leaving her house and zooming to her workplace. She had to tell the only person who vaguely knew about this, she needed to show this to Terry. She had to prove this to him, _right the fuck now._

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Adrian is a giant dork XD**

 **If y'all have ever watched** _ **The Brave Little Toaster**_ **, you'd know how fucking dark that movie really was… omg, but it was great tbh. There are a lot of similarities that all the characters share with Zamasu. Some fanart people gotta see and draw some of these scenes, they'd be amazing, and I actually didn't define the word 'brug' differently here; it's basically a 'bro hug'... I know, it's stupid, but I like it XD**

 **I want you guys to keep in mind the trends that you have been seeing with Rebecca. Zamasu is starting to see that this woman has some… 'quirks' to her person, and it'll intrigue him to figure out her inner workings over time. And there is a reason why I used the color linings that I did; these colors have both positive and negative connotations. Yellow is the color of joy and purpose, but dull-yellow represent caution and decay. Red represents fire and energy, dark red is associated with anger and wrath. The black ink used wasn't for no reason either; black is the color of mystery and the unknown.**


	17. An Emotional Crisis

**Just to say here; this is Zamasu's third day in Rebecca's house. On to something else, this is for the one review telling me to get a deadline…**

 **BOY… I kinda post new chapters every week so, it isn't like I left the story sitting on its ass for months. Don't worry, I won't hold you on that, I'm just saying.**

 **Sometimes it's fun to sit with a final copy and not publish it as soon as it's done :)**

 **Anyways, we getting on with this chapter which is exceptionally longer than the other few, but that's good, is it not?**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **An Emotional Crisis**

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Rebecca kept her focus solely on her job. She focused heavily, not even making room to talk about how her morning was or anything. She didn't even tell Terry the second she walked in Greinhardt's Hospital, the doctor rather would wait until the end of her shift to tell her fellow gynecologist, who was to leave at the same time that she would today. At least that would keep him from worrying while he's working.

It is 3:00 right now, it's finally time for her to leave so she said her goodbyes to everyone, and looked around for Terry. She was lucky to find him walking to his car, and she ran to him. "Terry!"

The Asian male turned around, his undercut was a bit messier today. "Hey, Rebecca! You're leaving early today, right?"

"Well yeah, umm… there is something I gotta tell you." She cut right to the chase, unable to speak about anything else because now that her work wasn't there to distract her, she couldn't think of anything else to talk about coherently.

He frowned. "What happened?"

"You know what, come to my car. I gotta show you this." Her car was about eight cars away from Terry's to the left. She didn't park at the edge of the hospital's parking lot today, Rebecca went out of her way to find a parking spot in the middle of the lot. She opened her car door and unlocked the front passenger's seat, taking that small box into her hand. "Get in. Sit down."

The man was confused. "Uhh, I have my own car you know."

"I know that but just sit." She went into her car, ushering him to sit in with her. When he did, he closed her passenger door before she even told him to do so. Had he not done that, it would have fed wrong ideas to her growing skepticism. "Remember when… I told you about what was going on, pertaining to Merkel and those vans?"

Terry nodded. "Uh-huh…"

"And right after I did, you said not to worry about them?"

"Yeah?"

"Well…" she looked down. "I drove home, got out of my car and started walking to my house, and then I heard rustling outside of my gates and something was thrown in my yard. That thing was this box." She brandished the small black box out of the armrest compartment next to the driver's seat, quickly going through the conundrum again and handing it to him. "The two pieces of paper were there when I solved the puzzle and opened it. All I did was turn it completely four times, turned it back twice, turned it halfway and kept the middle piece facing downwards."

Terry looked at both strips of paper, the yellow lined one made his eyebrow raise at the random street address and the very specific time; what the hell is that supposed to mean? Is it some place that she's supposed to be at or some place that she should avoid at all costs? There were no other stipulations on that paper. He brought his attention to the red one and reading it slowly widened his eyes. This small piece of paper, that said 'He Can't Harm You, But We Will' was written as though whoever sent this was eavesdropping on their conversation. But then he noticed something peculiar…

"Rebecca," Terry was frowning, she looked at him and he looked back up at her. " _This looks like your handwriting_."

Green eyes blinked, and she leaned in to see. "What?" Rebecca took one of the sheets and she didn't even notice that whoever wrote this managed to _perfectly_ copy her handwriting. That meant that this person had been around her long to know how her fucking penmanship was. Her head slowly shook in disbelief, an array of thoughts already hitting her mind. "No…"

"Umm… are you sure you found this thrown in your yard?" Terry scratched the back of his head. That was one thought that the doctor already had before he voice it; disbelief. Rebecca knew that _to some extent_ , she wasn't insane; that actually happened and she was the only one who witnessed it.

And that was the problem; her being the only witness to these things, and these people are covering their tracks far better than she had expected. The creepiest thing of all this, aside from certainly knowing where she lives, eavesdropping on her conversations, and giving her this random box, was that it looked like she had wrote this all on her own. Every letter of every word was written in her handwriting to a T, this person had to be someone who was close enough to her in order to watch her write.

"It was _thrown_ , Terry." Rebecca started sounding anxious. "It literally was tossed into my yard, and I picked it up and did all this stupid shit to open it- I swear, all of that happened!" She started raising her voice, speaking frantically fast. "I don't know the who the fuck wrote that, and it sure as shit wasn't me! I would never do something like this and act as truthfully scared as I am, you know that already!"

"Rebecca, Rebecca, _calm down_." The 38-year old gynecologist reached out to hold her arms reassuringly. He can see that she was getting really frustrated even though he didn't outright say that she was fooling him. "Listen, you wanna show this to the police so that they can track this down? I can call up my buddy right now, and have them found in no time."

The buddy Terry was referring to was a police lieutenant; those within that position can coordinate the happenings within a crime scene, and even administer detective work if needed. Rebecca looked at him. "You can?"

"Yes… hopefully he's not involved with the shootout that occurred a couple days ago. If he is, then I'll take this directly to the police department."

"Let me go with you." Her determined answer came quickly. And then she backtracked, taking note of the mode of transportation she'll need. "You'll drive in your car and I'll follow in mine."

Terry was about to question, but he had chosen against it because of the evidence that she had salvaged. "Alright. I'll get in my car, and start driving, you'll follow suit." He opened her car door and closed it, leaving the red haired woman to wait until seeing his car pass hers and peel off the lot. Once he did, she accelerated too, going the same exact direction as he was.

The police department was fifteen minutes away from the hospital. Of course, in such proximity, she doubted that anything would try to come between her and Terry on the road. Whoever tried it would get caught within mere minutes. She noticed that she was getting dangerously close to speeding and took a deep breath, steadying her nerves. _I need to calm down, I need to calm down._..she can't risk getting into an accident or being stopped by the police… on her way to the police department. That would be horribly ironic.

Terry made it half a minute faster than she did in due time. She placed the papers in the small box and closed it to make sure that none of it would fall off. All she'd have to do was open it again, anyway. Rebecca stepped out of her car, closing and locking it like six times, and walked with the box in her purse to Terry who had also got out of his car. The both of them looked at each other and Terry tried to engage in a bit of small talk to keep the nervous doctor from… becoming more nervous. It was working partially, because Rebecca herself knew that she needed to calm down. With the cutting-edge technology that's available these years, this simple paper-in-a-puzzle-box mystery would be solved easily.

As they continued talking, a few police sergeants were nonchalantly walking with one another in a camaraderie group. Rebecca did not, and could not feel the miniscule vibration the box made as they passed the police officers.

Entering the department was like walking into a new part of some store. A lot of things were renovated due to the recent advances in computer technology, so now the lofty lobby had a large holographic map of West City that was vertical and new white exposition chairs along with a table that was floating over a superconductive reactor. The two approached the front desk and one of the detectived approached Terry and gave him a handshake.

"Mark!" The Asian gynecologist smiled at the blonde man. He had facial hair with a growing buzz cut and brown eyes. He explained what he was doing and Rebecca formerly greeted Mark in the process. Mark lead them to one of the rooms where he had left from; the detectives were sitting together in the room, leisurely talking about cases and having minute discussions.

The blonde man knocked on the door and after the accepted response, he opened it to reveal three eminent detectives sitting in a comfy lounge room. "You guys," Mark spoke casually because he knew all of them; they all worked side-by-side oftentimes and all were names to be reckoned with. God help the criminal's prints that ended up in these guys' hands. "We got a little bit of a pickle here."

Rebecca raised a brow; Mark was one of those people who had some of those most creative phrases for anything. He was a character, essentially. Both she, Mark and Terry stepped in and took a seat with all the detectives who equally welcomed the explication of this 'pickle' the doctor got into. Rebecca spoke first. "This little box was thrown in my yard through the gates. Right after that happened, a black van strolled by in front of the gates slowly." She pulled the box out of her purse. "It had two pieces of paper in it, one with an address and a time, and another saying that some man I encountered wouldn't harm me, but _they-_ whoever _they_ are- can."

One of the detectives' name was Hubbs. The short man nodded after she had finished speaking. "Sounds like one of them cases of targeting." He took the box from her hand still keeping his arm outstretched looking at the conundrum in the front. "But this seems pretty… easy to pinpoint. All we have to do is scan it and we can easily find out where this came from." He shrugged.

Another detective got up. "I'll reel it in. The portable ones would quickly solve this." He left the lounge room shortly.

Mark looked at Rebecca. "You mind opening this for us? We'd like to see what these papers look like."

"Sure. No problem." She took the box and was pretty avid on getting this case done. She quickly did the whole procedure on behalf of opening the box; four complete turns, two complete turns backwards, a halfway turn forward, the middle piece kept downward, and finally, she pulled the top.

But it wouldn't open.

Rebecca frowned, and tried again much slower this time. Still, despite putting the same procedures to this little box, it wouldn't budge. She kept repeatedly trying a few times. "What the…?"

"Is it not opening?" Terry raised a brow. "Didn't you zoom through this back in the car?"  
"Yeah, I'm doing the same exact thing I did earlier and it's just… not… opening!" She now was trying frustratedly to pry it open and Terry once again had to tell her to relax.

"Really?" Jones, the detective next to Hubbs, took the box out of her hands and carefully examined it. The conundrum itself didn't even look that hard and was too small to be compact, how the heck could one forget or misdo this puzzle more than five times? Jones narrowed his eyes at the bottom, noticing a tiny transparent circle directly in the middle of the box. This circle looked like it held a small light source which was on at the moment and it was blue. "I think… there's more to this than the puzzle."

"What do you mean?" Terry leaned forward, and Rebecca mirrored the same action with an equal amount of inquiry.

"I've seen a lot of these lights used for security purposes." Jones lowered the box so that he could look at the both of them. "There is a tiny blue light on the bottom of this little box. When the light is on, it either turns something on or off or in this case, unlocks or locks something. Though in order to do this, something has to be triggered in order for that to take place."

Leave it to Jones to figure out how newer mechanics worked. This guy never fails to answer questions. "But what could possibly trigger that box? It's smaller than my thumb!" Hubbs raised both hands, intrigued at the quick finding from his acquaintance. He was right though, the box was only an inch a half in length, width, and height.

"Don't let its size fool you, Hubbs. I'm certain there is more to this than just a little puzzle." At that moment, that detective that left earlier came back with a small device. This piece gadget had a four-by-four inch square platform that was made of borosilicate glass, and above it was a rectangular scanner that was centered and on the right edge, and a fourth of the platform's size. There was a screen light used to light up the flatbed scanner, and the buttons were all touchscreen. The man placed the scanner down on the table and Jones placed the box on the glass platform.

"I think we ought to set it up a little differently." Mark was the one tapping buttons on the scanner's touchscreen. "Let it look for its possible previous locations, as well as blueprint the inside so we can enable it again." With a final tap, they all watched as the blue laser light spanned the entire platform, starting at the very edge and going downwards pretty quickly.

One rotation was done, the scanner was moving slowly to fully comprehend the box's innards. Mark pressed a button and another screen popped up on the top of the scanner showing _one thousand and fifty four_ different locations of the box to everyone, scattered through West and East City mostly in the latter of the two.

"I thought this was gonna be pretty easy to follow through with..." Mark blinked, watching the scanner now reaching midway through the box. Out of nowhere, the blue light flickered and the scanning abruptly stopped. After a few seconds, its head started moving by millimeters without the scanner's light turning on.

"Huh?" Terry cocked his neck. "That's not supposed to happen." Him being a gynecologist, he had seen many scanners in his life and there were only two reasons as to why it stopped; the scanner picked up a problem, or whatever it was scanning had material in it had could have affected the scanner.

"It isn't. Hold on." Mark did a few more taps to show the logs of what the scanner had recorded prior to stopping. "The last logs keep saying 'Material cannot be processed, skipping iteration'."

Hubbs looked at Mark. "What did you set it on?"

"I wanted to see where we could enable it, so it should bring up a transparent blueprint of what the box looks like inside and out, but now it might be a little inaccurate." The scanner, after passing through half a centimeter of the middle, started working properly again.

"Why couldn't it process whatever is in it though? From what you told me, there was paper inside and paper doesn't affect the scanner at all." A detective was looking at the scanner as it stopped.

"Unless if it was laced with something."

Everyone looked at Hubbs. The only person with an agreeing look was Jones, but the short man continued. "Paper can be processed by this thing, but if it's laced with some other material that the scanner refuses to pick up then that may be the case."

"We might actually have to crack this thing open. Mark, can you pinpoint the primary location of the box?"

"Yes. Let me specify the filters." After a few taps, some of the locations disappeared per second until there was 15 of them left.

" _15 primary locations_?!" The detective who retrieved the scanner was called Ken. He exclaimed at the finding; objects can only originate from one primary location, that is where it is either made, enabled, or activated. These 15 locations spanned far across the City, they were literally _miles_ apart, including some from East City as well which were also fairly spaced. "The only way this could happen is if the box has a disabling mechanism."

"It does. That blue light on the bottom indicates it." Jones pointed to the light and Ken nodded.

He scratched his head and adjusted his bifocals out of habit. "Right, so this thing had to be triggered fifteen times, in order to reset its primary location. They managed to figure that out with this, but I'm wonder how this scanner picked up the previous locations if the box has been disabled and reset."

"It saves the location of those in which it was resetted at." Jones took the box. The papers inside might give us a clue as to where this thing came from. I'll go to one of the techguys' rooms to open this." He stood up. "I reckon Terry, Mark and Rebecca follow me. I don't know if the rest of you'd like to join in on this." He opened the door and left the room. The trio; Mark, Rebecca and Terry followed him out.

"I'm intrigued." Ken stood up and followed suit.

"We're detectives, _of course_ we ought to be intrigued!" Hubbs stood up, the stocky male grumbling under his breath about his comrade, in a playful tone of course.

As they walked through the halls to get to the main tech inspectors, Terry looked over at Rebecca and frowned. The red haired woman was having a really hard time concentrating, she seemed to be both dazed and tired. But either way, she still looked worried. "Hey," he held her arm, "It's gonna be fine. Trust in them, they know what they're doing."

"Yeah yeah, I know…" she nodded him off, looking down at the ground. The redhead had been _extremely_ quiet back in the other room, and it was started to concern him. He had knew her every since she stepped foot into the hospital, and over the past three years, Terry knew that Rebecca was a woman of many worries. If she openly expresses it towards you, you can't help but notice that she always looks like that on a daily basis, he even joked about her having gray hairs within the next three years over her worrisome behavior.

They reached the tech inspection room, Rebecca immediately blinking when that blast of cool air hit her face as the doors slid open. Jones addressed one of the men looking over his desktop, and explained the whole situation with the box. This tech support's name was Xavier, he was about as tall as Terry, who was half a foot taller than the redhead.

Xavier turned in his seat, tapping his optima-style glasses. "You're telling me that the scanner couldn't completely scan this box."

"Yes." Jones nodded, and Xavier stood up. "Alright, I'll run this through the bigger ones, and I can infer what the problem might be. This same material it can't process may have avulsive properties, in a sense. The smaller scanners are very efficient, but the lasers used in them run under a high frequency output. That might heat up the material to the point where it could be turned into a gas, assuming there is very miniscule amount of that material."

That made a lot of sense, the detectives and Terry nodded comprehensively. Xavier wheeled in a larger scanner with a more robust arm and an orange light laser scanner. While the portable one didn't have a mobile arm and was only eight inches tall, this scanner was more sophisticated, with a larger flatbed platform made of a stronger material of glass. The platform itself was rectangular, being around 18-by-22 inches in length and width, most of it was a nice pearly white color with titanium steel in some parts.

Rebecca looked for a seat to sit down in while this was going on.

Xavier had to power the scanner on and reach over to his desk to grab a remote and pressed a button. A 20-inch wide monitor slid in from across the room and then the arms holding the monitor turn it so that its back was facing the wall. Xavier placed the box on the scanner and set up certain protocols, including the rechecking of the locations and a blueprint for the box.

This scanning was different; orange light casted down on the area of which the box was instead of scanning the whole platform. Immediately after, the monitor showed the primary locations, now of which being nine. The arm then closed in on the box and moved back, exacting an exoskeletal blueprint that was holographically shown on top of the scanner.

The logs appeared on the monitor as well, Mark reading through them as they passed noting that this scanner actually was able to pick up the material. "Well, that's intricate…"

"What?" Jones was busy studying the holographic blueprint.

"'Hazardous material found. Decreasing iteration'..." Mark scratched his chin. The portable scanner could not pick up whether the material was dangerous or not, it just refused to process it.

"Ya know, we're actually lucky to have a rich, innovative engineer come up with a safelock for that, otherwise it probably would have broke the other scanner." Hubbs chuckled, approving of Xavier's handiwork.

"Exactly. Umm, I can pull up the properties of this material right now." Xavier tapped certain buttons on the touchscreen, and it started loading up a separate batch of logs containing more details for this specific material. "There is indeed paper in it, and it is laced with somethi-" He stopped when the all the logs came up, and since Mark was the closest to the monitor he noticed it just as fast as Xavier did.

"What? Why is the text red for those logs?" Jones approached the monitor.

Mark's hand slowly descended from his chin. "Oh…"

Xavier finished his sentence with him simultaneously. "... _Shit_."

Hubbs and Terry and Ken approached the monitor next. The gynecologist read the logs, and his eyes nearly bugged out of their sockets. "There were small traces of _galena_ on those papers!"

"Of what?" Hubbs raised a brow at Terry.

Xavier explained it for him. "Galena is technically lead, rather a natural mineral form of lead sulfide. The logs are showing skipped iterations as well, but it still pinpointed the material, and those papers were very lightly coated with the powered form of it which is _very poisonous_."

Mark looked at his friend, who was still looking at the monitor. "There are very very tiny traces of it when this thing was scanned, and Rebecca told me that she had opened it first thing this morning, so that means…" Terry looked back at the redhead doctor, who was now sitting with one hand resting on her head, and her other arm was across her abdomen with her hand resting on her upper thigh. Her face was downcast.

"Rebecca?" Terry quickly approached his fellow doctor and knelt forward to see her face. Her eyes were still opened, but she looked heavily disoriented.

"Hmm? What?" She blinked at him.

"Lead poisoning…" Xavier approached the doctor. "You went through the day washing your hands at certain points, right? How long were you exposed to those papers?"

She frowned. "I don't know..." Rebecca looked up at him and then looked back down. "I have a very bad headache."

"Have you had this headache for a long time, like ever since the morning or did it occur recently?"

She frowned again. "...I don't remember."

 _Oh shit_ , Terry held her arm and pulled her up, gently coaxing her to rise to her feet. "I'll take her back to the hospital and give her something to get rid of the lead in her system. You guys can continue on and I'll come back."

"You need help?" Mark lended a help hand, and Terry thanked him even though Rebecca could walk on her own. The thing is, with her state right now she could fall at any moment being fatigued so quickly, so they weren't taking any second chances.

"Alright, I'll drive her car to the hospital." Terry tossed his keys to Mark. "You could drive me back here, I'll call you."

"No, I'd rather take your car with you. Makes things easier, I don't mind the wait." Mark went to Terry's vehicle and opened the door.

"Just follow me on the way!" Terry took Rebecca's keys after she had pointed to them and opened the passenger door for her to go in. The redhead clumsily got in almost bumping her head against the top of the door opening which nearly gave Terry a heart attack.

"I'm gonna get you to the hospital to get rid of your lead poisoning." He sat on her driver's seat, turned on her car and peeled off the police department's lot. Within ten minutes of the fifteen minute drive, he felt Rebecca tap his shoulder again.

"Why are you driving my car?"

Terry would glance at her and then back at the road. "You got lead poisoning right now. We just left the police department ten minutes ago."

She nodded. And then she swung her head back at him. "Why were we at the police department?"

And within those ten minutes, she hadn't managed to catch on the reason for him driving, and now forgotten what occurred within the past half hour. He knew lead poisoning caused short term memory loss to some extent, but this was _way worse_ for such a small dose of lead. Terry narrowed his eyes; there has to be something else on those papers. Rebecca touched it long enough to extrapolate most of the chemicals laced on the papers which is why it wasn't affecting Terry as much, but he also needed to take precautions for this as well.

He arrived at the hospital, leaving his car and opening Rebecca's door to get her out. The woman looked like she could barely keep her eyes open even though she was standing perfectly fine, and Terry looked to see where his car was. He looked at the lot, there was no Mark in sight.

"Terry!"

Terry nearly jumped at the sound of his name being called, only to see Mark jogging to him. "How the heck did you get here faster than me?"

"I took a shortcut." He answered plainly.

"The heck shortcut'd you take?"

He answered quickly. "The one that was shorter than the others, now we need to get her in there, you didn't need to look for me!"

They entered the hospital, passing through everyone to find a free room. Mark asked on of the receptionist and they told him that a room was available on the third floor, so they went up the elevator with Terry still holding Rebecca's arms.

The three reached the room. Terry laid her down on the hospital bed which was then tilted up to keep her in a reclined sitting position. He pressed buttons, requesting a quick capsule for chemical poisonings, and Mark sat next to Rebecca watching her symptoms take place. They engaged in a tiny conversation.

"Rebecca," Mark waved his hand in front of the woman. "Can you see me clearly?"

"Yeah I can." Both of her eyebrows raised. "Who are you?"

Mark frowned. "Umm… I'm Mark, the guy from the police department."

"I've never seen you before." The doctor furrowed her brows. "Why are you here?"

The detective had the most perplexed look on his face. "I don't think tiny doses of lead do that much to your short-term memory."

Terry nodded. "I thought of that before, but this was in her possession since yesterday night, she told me." The Asian looked at the door. "There has to be something else involved."

"LAST NIGHT?!" Mark's hands were on his head.

"She told me she didn't open it until this morning, actually. If she opened it yesterday, she'd be admitted to the hospital within an hour of contact." One of the nurses came by with the appropriate capsule, and Terry clicked it open and out popped a vial and a syringe for lead poisoning. The gynecologist isn't as worried as he was before, he had finally acquired what he needed. Technology nowadays advanced medical science, so things like lead poisoning weren't as hard to cure as they used to be. "Alright. Hey Rebecca, I'm going to give you this. It might hurt a little but… yeah." He was over here telling another doctor that a freaking needle might hurt, he knew damn well she knew the pep talk drill anyway.

"Alright." Mark looked at Rebecca, who was staring off to the wall somewhere. Terry held her arm and injected the needle within her. Rebecca didn't even seem to notice, it wasn't as if she was unconscious either, she was just that disoriented. The two males gave it a good two minutes to see if her side effects would wear off.

Rebecca blinked in recognition this time, she has this frown on her face. "...Terry?" She sat up completely.

"Hey, Rebecca." Terry approached her putting a hand on her shoulder. Mark did this semi-wave and he smiled. She returned the smile back.

"Does your head still hurt?" Mark wheeled his chair closer to her and she shook her head. The blonde man then turned to Terry. "I think we should stay here for a good ten or something minutes, just to see if things level out."

"Fifteen at best." Terry nodded, and looked down while leaning against the counter.

Rebecca looked at Terry and Mark. The gynecologist she knew for years had such a worried look on his face, because he had finally realized that this whole ordeal was actually _real_. The same with Mark, who was on the phone checking on behalf of the findings they salvaged and it turns out they needed specialized gadgets to handle and unlock the box without disturbing or coming into contact with the powdered traces of galena. It's been a long time since she's seen her fellow doctors so worried. Even in the time that they stayed for _her_ sake, several other doctor stopped by in the crunch of their time to see if she was okay. France, at one point came in and gave her some more days off to get better. She was offered food even, in truth she hadn't had anything to ingest ever since yesterday. The doctor had a very bad tendency of not eating breakfast and the only people the knew that were Irene, Terry, France, and some other nurses she'd speak often with. And here one of them came, Terry and Mark staying back for longer making sure she'd eat something before leaving the hospital.

Just seeing all of this in front of her, it struck something deep and theoretically immovable within her. She didn't know what it was, but something in her was moved by the spectacle.

She stayed mostly quiet while eating. The food in wasn't as bland as many other hospitals, and their menus came with a wide variety for many diets. Rebecca didn't attempt to speak much because she was eating, and because from what she had seen, which confirmed something within her that she had always thought to be untrue…

The doctor found that there was nothing else that she could possibly say.

I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I:I

It was in the middle of the afternoon, around 3, and the breeze had now started to catch on outside. There was still no sign of any entering car outside of her gates, and almost every room within Rebecca's mansion was silent.

Well, minus Ollie and Loki waltzing around the living room in the presence of the Kaioshin. Every once in awhile Ollie and Loki would look out the front wall windows to see if their owner was about to arrive. She was actually a bit late, for reasons unknown to her dogs who knew her schedule better than the Kaioshin did…

Which is why he was still sitting on her living room couch, watching a comedic movie with both legs crossed in is sitting position.

Okay, to be fair, Zamasu had taken a break albeit a short one. It was like thirty something minutes, he made some tea and in the time of making that tea he played with the two dogs even more. Loki was starting to build some trust in him, both dogs were now comfortable in his presence. They had small dispensable feeding machines that they could go and cater themselves with, and because they were well-behaved the canines knew when their feeding time was when Rebecca wasn't home.

Beforehand in the morning, Zamasu made a proposition to counteract the amount of time he had spent, you know, _obviously not_ watching movies for more than seven something hours while Rebecca was gone. While Ollie was chewing on a carrot, Zamasu knelt down in front of the pug who looked up at him with big eyes.

" _Ollie?" The Kaioshin smiled down at the innocent pug. Ollie picked up his inquiring voice. "You mind helping me with something?"_

 _Because of the fact that the Shinjin were highly intuitive, it's easy to communicate with beings on a much grander scale. So he could speak to either Ollie and Loki and they both would understand what he'd say without really having to process his words and relying on memorization. The pug barked in acceptance, and Zamasu rubbed his pudgy head._

" _Good. You know what time Rebecca would be returning correct?"_

 _A bark._

 _Zamasu nodded. "So, if you see her car outside, can you bark for me?"_

 _Ollie tilted his head, but still barked in compliance. Zamasu rubbed his stomach which made the pug roll onto his back with that silly smile on his face._

It was a great plan when Zamasu administered it, but what indicated that Rebecca was later than usual was Ollie and Loki repeatedly looking out the wall windows. He assumed that she'd be home forty-five minutes before 4:00 pm or something. The Kaioshin raised a brow at the tardiness, but didn't think much of it for sometime.

About an hour later, it was 4:54PM, and there were no signs of Rebecca's car. The dogs would look outside but they didn't bark, and at the same time Zamasu's curiosity was getting to him. But it was quickly drowned down when he decided that she knew how to return to her own house and that she was just a little late, and also because this gave him more time to watch this movie. He felt something nudge his leg, and it was Ollie. The Kaioshin looked down and the pug jumped up to sit in his lap.

Dogs have a special sense about them. They can sense things better than humans can but less than Kais for that matter. The way Ollie looked up at him with a slight tinge of trepidation in his eyes indicated that the pug, and even Loki who was now approaching the two, that their owner must've been in some sort of danger.

The Kaioshin could read this very well, but he had no other means of contacting Rebecca at all, and he can't just teleport to wherever she was at the moment. He didn't want to leave the dogs alone, and he also didn't want to impede on something he _shouldn't be seeing_. "I'm sure that she isn't in any danger, you two. She's just running late, that's all."

The more they continued to look him, the more he started second guessing his reassurance. But he couldn't outright do that because it would make both her dogs anxious, so he reassured them a little bit more while watching his movie. Within about three minutes, Ollie and Loki were comforted enough to leave his arms and went on to do their dog activities. Ten minutes afterwards, because Zamasu was so focused on what was going on in the movie, he didn't notice the other dogs intuitively pick up Rebecca's impending arrival.

Ollie barked multiple times when he saw Rebecca's car enter the front yard, and Zamasu sat straight up his seat and started reaching for the screen where the movie could be paused. The TV came with a remote as well, and Zamasu didn't know how to open up the touchscreen because he didn't have the password for it. Not wanting to waste time on being an idiot tapping on a black screen repeatedly, he turned to his right to get the remote… but it wasn't there.

"Uhh…" he started fumbling around, getting out of his seat and searching the sectional couch. "Ollie, Loki, where's the remote? Can you two help me find it?"

The dogs accordingly scattered around the place to help him in his search, and Zamasu had quickly realized that he left the remote upstairs.

What kind of stupid person leaves a TV remote in a place where a TV _isn't_ located? Why was it upstairs in the first place? The Kaioshin couldn't take the time to answer those questions right now, he made a beeline up her stairs at incredible speed and into his room, where the remote laid on his bed. Like a genius, he ran to his bed and snatched the remote and immediately right after just stopped himself.

 _...I could have just teleported up here and got the remote in a mere second!_ And even if he didn't he could have used his telekinesis to retrieve the remote from the other side of the hallway. Sometimes he really wondered if he was as smart as he'd like to think.

Zamasu decided to actually be smart this time, and he teleported into her living room, telling both Ollie and Loki to calm down as he had found the remote. That was a third of the battle, because now he was staring at the remote with the most confused look on his face. _Where's the stop button?_ There were nothing but symbols and numbers and letters, none of which spelled out the word 'stop'. He scratched his head, reverting to his trusted smarticles again; there was button that looked like a triangle, and maybe triangles symbolize stop in human language or something. He pressed that but the movie was still playing, and then he looked at the 'button with a circle and a line sticking out of it'. He didn't know that was the power button, so when he pressed it the entire TV turned off, which possibly solved his problem.

It was that easy? Zamasu pressed it again just to make sure, and he realized that it turned off the TV and didn't stop the movie. The Kaioshin looked through the barrage of buttons again, and noticed a button with a square on it just in time. He pressed it, and the movie was indeed stopped and it returned to the title screen. He then shut the TV off completely and started hearing the sound of a doorknob being turned. He whipped his head back as Ollie and Loki barked at him, how does one look inconspicuous? He dashed into the kitchen and pulled out the kettle and added water into it. He was literally doing all of this, teleporting to each part of the kitchen, and when the stove was on Rebecca opened her living room door. As her door opened, the Kaioshin quickly teleported himself back upstairs.

"Ollie, Loki! Hey guys!" She chuckled strangely but still smiled at sight of her innocent canine kids. Rebecca closed the door and petted them all, apologizing for making them worry. Well, rather she figured she ought to, because this whole day consisted of people worrying about her. The redhead undid her ponytail letting her red tresses fall to their mid-waist length, and she looked in the kitchen to see her kettle being heated on the stove.

"Zamasu?" She called out to him, and Ollie sat quietly watching the Kaioshin walk downstairs casually. The pug tilted his head, and Rebecca raised a brow at Ollie's sudden quiet nature, but she looked at the green man walking towards her. For some reason, she couldn't look him in the eyes because of what happened today and it had nothing to do with him.

"Hello."

The redhead was looking down when he spoke. She clasped her hand behind her back timidly. "I'm back. I'm sorry I'm late, I just ran into certain thin-"

Without warning, she was lifted off the ground again. Zamasu telekinetically held her up in the air horizontally, moving her back into the living room and she, as expected, started protesting immediately.

"Zamasu, this isn't _fair_! I came home from a long day of work and _then some_ , and you pull this bullshit on me!" She started thrashing in front of him, Zamasu still having a calm demeanor about him and her dogs barked intriguingly at the sight of their owner somehow 'stuck in the air'.

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "You think I'd let you slide for poking my nose?" He took a few more steps forward with his hand midway raised. "You got a lot of nerve to just casually do such a thing to me."

Actually, he was mostly doing this because he didn't want her to figure out that he had spent hours doing nothing but watching movies, Rebecca didn't need to know that. "But I didn't poke you! I just tapped your nose!" She gave him a cross look, and he smirked. "You're just doing this because it's amusing, huh?"

He shook his head. "You deserve it. Amusement has nothing to do with this."

"You're such a meanieeee." She thrashed again trying to somehow break out of his hold but that ain't never gonna happen. "Okay, I'm sorry! Just please put me down!"

Zamasu looked to the side, blinked in thought, and then smirked back at her. "I don't really feel like it." He angled his hand sideways, and Rebecca started slowly spinning.

"You fucking asshole!" She was getting really annoyed at this point, and her dogs were both starting to get concerned at her temper.

"Ah-ah, watch your language around me, _human_." He approached her spinning body and every time her face would reach him, she'd give him an angry look. "Do you want me to drop you?"

" _Yes_! Please do!" Rebecca answered out of spite and then she realized who exactly she was talking to. The doctor looked down to see that she was a good seven or eight feet above the ground. She then retracted her statement. "Wait just… Don't drop me on the floor, please."

He stopped her rotating when she was facing him, very peeved off green eyes stared into calm grey ones. And he _smiled_ at her. "Okay." He telekinetically moved her to her fluffy, comfortable couch without changing the height she was at, and then release his hold on her, watching her fall down to her couch. Her hair was a scattered mess on one of the pillows, but she still popped her head up to give him a sour look. She stood up and stomped over to him with her hands clenched into fists but all she could do was just glare up at him when she was close enough to do so.

"Is this what you're gonna do to me all month?" She pouted angrily.

"Not unless if you make unnecessary contact with me."

She was gonna say something but she stopped and yawned, exhausted. All that thrashing she did took all the energy out of her. "If I… end up falling on you because of tired I am, will you do that to me again?"

He sensed her exhaustion right before she yawned. "Probably." Even before he finished, she started leaning forward and fell right into his chest. He didn't even hold her or anything, he just stood there and looked down at this red headed mortal who decided to use him as a pillow. "You have a bed upstairs, you know."

Her head was sliding down his chest and he held her arms to keep her upright. He tried moving her off but Rebecca resisted and kept her hands on his sides.

"No no no, please stay like this. I don't… feel like moving." She yawned into his gi and looked up at him, resting her chin on his chest. "I'm tired."

"I can see that." He blinked down at her, inwardly complaining about the proximity of her body to his. Her face was in his chest again and he frowned. "You're really short."

Her voice was muffled because her face was against him, but she did say 'No I'm not'. He moved back still holding her upright, and she blinked. "What is it?"

"If you need to sleep, then go upstairs. Do not sleep on me." Zamasu shook his head.

Rebecca yawned again. "But… that's far away-"

In a split second, Rebecca went from standing in her kitchen to standing right in front of her bed. "...Oh."

Zamasu nodded. "Now go. Sleep." He turned around to walk away and Rebecca held his arm before he got too far. He sighed. "What now?"

He didn't hear an immediate response, so he turned around to see that she was shyly looking down again. She looked back up at him, her mouth opening and closing at first, as if what she had to say was hard to formulate. She took a slightly shaky breath, there was a lot of hidden emotion in her eyes. "Umm, thank you..."

He raised a brow; all he did was teleport her to her room. But he can see that there were multiple things that ran through her head before she thanked him. "You're... welcome." Weirdly enough, he can _feel_ the urge she had to hug him, for some strange reason, but she turned around to lay on her bed. He furrowed his brows, and walked out of her room, closing her door.

Rebecca laid in a fetally under her blankets, and held her arms in a self-hugging position. It had been a long time, a _painfully_ long time, since she had seen so much concern from other people, for _her_. For the longest, all she had done was keep herself from getting into any sort of conflict because it seemed like she'll be the only one walking with only one leg out of one. Rebecca thought that her social life was very much one-dimensional; her being on the respondent end rather than attaining both sides of the spectrum. She'd speak with others, but others wouldn't speak to her, or she'd care about people, and she'd see that those people wouldn't care about her the same way. She had gotten accustomed to this for so long, that she literally thought that was how things were going to be for her forever.

She thought that no one would give a rat's ass about where she was or how she was doing, the only two beings would be her two dogs that showed their form of concern. She thought that those she spoke with wouldn't actually take into consideration what she had to say, and this stemmed down from her high school years when she'd run around and do reckless things. Back then, she could cry in front of someone and they would either pity her or ignore her completely, both of which were too painful to bear when you're emotional and need a shoulder to cry on.

When was the last time she had a shoulder to cry on?

 _Now look at me_ , everyone was basically acting as they normally should during an emergency. There was no hype, there was no exaggerating at all, the people around her were just genuinely wanting to know if she was okay. Rebecca could only say yes, there was nothing else she could formulate. To see that she wasn't alone in her own conflicts sometimes was just…

It was too much, to see all of that in one day.

Here the red haired woman laid, small tears falling out of her eyes. Even Zamasu for that matter held her up when she was super tired. She was expecting him to just move and let her drop because she annoyed him earlier, and because he didn't like it when people touched him, but he didn't; he teleported to her room in an instant seeing that she was tired. Obviously, he probably did that because he wanted her off of him but still, she expected him to let her fall and make her crawl up the stairs as exhausted as she is, and go to bed on her own. He was _god_ after all, the guy could've shoved her down to the floor with no remorse if he needed to.

She continued to sob quietly. It's not because she was poisoned earlier, but because of the response to her being poisoned, and also the revelations that she had in the event. Just realizing how utterly lamentable her mindset was for other people caring about her made her express her sorrowful, and her acknowledgement of _loss_ , through tears. She turned in her spot, reminded of certain things that were said to her over the phone a month ago.

By a certain man, whom she called yesterday.

Deep down, a part of her knew that what Jay said was true. He concluded all of her deepest inner problems and explained them better than she ever could, but to dwell on such a thing was too painful for her to go back into. If she did, she'd be crying until the sun were to rise again. And with another being in her house who'd probably get annoyed at seeing her being all emotional, which is why she didn't just outright sob and hug Zamasu on the spot. It would be painful to watch someone else stare at her with angry pity once again.

That same portion of her mind somehow figured out that Jay understood her better than most people. But she didn't realize that fully at the moment.

The woman stayed this way for some time, silently crying herself to sleep. She knew that when she'd wake up again sometime later, she'll go back to being normal and neutral again. She knew that she wouldn't dwell on behalf of this situation, for the sake of her own heart, after this particular nap. Though she figured that from how worked off she was today, she'd probably sleep until late at night and since she had a few days off to recuperate, it wasn't that much of a problem. The doctor was given more drinkable vials to take once a day back at the hospital, and Mark told her and Terry that they'd contact them on behalf of the findings that they'll extract. Rebecca sighed as she felt herself slowly drift off to sleep, her tear stained face becoming unstrained and she finally rested in peace.

ΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦθΦ

Her first exhibition was in two days, and the afro-haired woman had now situated herself in her motel. Irene was wearing a soft casual black robe, she had ordered room service which just came by, and now what sat in front of her was a vegetable and seafood tempura and hot pot ramen. Her dessert was a small cute plate of a few strawberry mochis.

Halfway through her eating, her thoughts went back to the day when she left. Adrian had called her later on at night and texted her a picture of him with Shona, telling her that the Mongolian actor said hi as well as the other people they had hung out with. Sometime during the conversation she had asked why Rebecca wasn't there as she knew her friend and Lexi were very close.

" _You do realize it's like midnight right now, right? Rebecca can't be drinking so late when she has a job."_

 _She smiled. "Riiight, I didn't think of the time there." It was early in the morning where she was at the time this call was executed._

That wasn't surprising. She has guy friends who are very considerate in their own weird ways.

Irene looked down at the mochi and ate one after everything else she had was finished and once she had taken a bit from it, she instantly thought of Zamasu. _That green motherfucker_ , he didn't have the decency to even shake her hand when she left. But she expected that, because in his own words, he hated her the absolute most.

Hopefully, he wasn't bothering Rebecca at all with his misanthropic arrogant-view of humans. Technically, he had sort of a reason to act the way he does because he actually isn't human, but Zamasu was a god, a God of Creation to be a bit more exact. His species are the same ones who have created human beings, to hate other humans would be to hate his species own wrongdoing, isn't it? She had never heard him question the fundamental reasoning behind why humans exist, and why the Kais created such a 'flawed' species amongst the many mortals. All he did was say that he was a god, and that she was lower than him, and that humans are disgusting horrible creatures, even though his species had created humans to 'be' that way.

She had more than enough time to reflect on what he says, and why he repeats it so fucking much during her plane ride. It's not like she could just dismiss whatever he had said to her, and even though she could turn a blind eye to it, his thought process interested her greatly. A lot of what he does is usually accompanied with some inner battle of choosing whether to act all godly or just be downright curious.

If by some silly chance, she might even hear Rebecca complain about him taunting her, which is _exactly_ what she did to Zamasu when he lived with her. As hypocritical as it sounds, it's something she'd expect from him.

Speaking of which, she reached for her phone and went through her contacts to find Rebecca, which didn't take long. She wanted to check on behalf of how she was doing, and how Zamasu has been faring. Several rings later, the other side had picked up.

There was a pause on the other side, and then finally the person spoke. "...Hello?"

She recognized the male voice instantly. "Zamasu!"

" _Oh, for Kami's sake…"_

Irene could see his facepalm. "I didn't think you'd be able to answer her phone so quickly! It's usually with her oftentimes."

He didn't even respond to her directly. "How is it that you manage to worm your way back into my life?"

Irene frowned. "You do realize that we're _both_ living together for a whole year, right? You're gonna be seeing my face in the next month, ya know."

He made this inaudible groan. "Unfortunately."

"Well, you haven't changed a bit." She shook her head. "Where's Rebecca? Is she not with you?"

"She fell asleep a couple of hours ago." Zamasu had made himself a cup of tea, fishing through Rebecca's fridge quietly. "Why?"

"Aww, I wanted to talk to her. At least I know she's okay."

"Well she's not awake at the moment so bye-"

"No, don't hang up! I wanted to talk to you too." She leaned forward, taking a bit of another mochi.

"I don't." She heard rummaging on the other end and narrowed her eyes.

"What are you doing?" Irene shook her afro, and the shifting stopped.

"Why does it concern you?" Zamasu continued his search, seeing a container of fresh strawberries in the fridge.

"I just wanna know…" She listened closely. Though the rummaging stopped, she could hear a container being placed against some hard surface. "Are you looking through her fridge?"

"No." He answered quickly.

Irene kissed her teeth. " _Riiight_ , bullshit."

She heard his hand noisily make contact with something, a table perhaps. "Do you not know how to speak to me, woman?"

Irene rolled her eyes. "I have a freaking name, you know it already."

"Hmmph."

He was being a complete cactus on the phone, and it's accurate because cacti are green. "What are you eating over there again?"

"What do you mean by _again_?"

"Well, I figured you'd be eating much more than usual, although it's not the food I make." She swiveled the overbed table to the side and laid down on her stomach.

A 'hmmph' on the other end. "I don't like your food."

" _Yes you do_." Irene smiled. "But seriously, what are you eating?"

"A fruit."

"A fruit?" She moved the curls from her face. "What is it, a strawberry or something?" There was a pause on the other end. "What?"

"How the _heck_ did you guess that correctly?" Unknown to her, Zamasu actually looked outside Rebecca's kitchen window because they're no way some _idiot woman_ is able to correctly tell of what he's eating without spying on him.

"Wait, you are?" Her chocolate brown eyes widened. "Holy shit! Because I'm eating a mochi right now," she took a bite out of said mochi, "and there's strawberries in it."

Is it a horrible coincidence that Irene just so happened to be eating the same exact fruit as he was at the same time, and she just so happened to call him and ask him what he was _eating_? "Okay?" He didn't voice how weird that was, but he didn't care about her strawberry mochis either.

"That's something." She was chewing while she said that.

His eye twitched. "It's not polite to chew while you speak, idiot."

"Fine." Irene ingested the mochi, and then sighed. "I didn't get a chance to ask how you were doing."

He raised a brow, unfamiliar with her sudden bypass of his insult. "Why does it matter?" Zamasu was genuinely confused.

"Becauuuse you live with me. I can't help but _want_ to know." Irene narrowed her eyes. "What, is it shocking that I have some sort of concern for you?"

"I am a god." He placed the fork down on his plate full of strawberries. "WHat is there to be concerned about?"

"Making sure you don't hurt my best friend."

She said that with such a calm and unhostile tone, knowing that he wouldn't put Rebecca in danger. But she still said it anyway, _because she's stupid_. "She isn't doing anything to me at the moment."

Basically, if Rebecca were to actually try to 'harm' him, he'll have to resort to doing what he did to James, or rather what he was _about_ to do. But he can't see the doctor attempt to try and hold a candle to his strength or powers. She wasn't that idiotic to try with him in the first place anyway.

"Just don't do anything to her. I know Ollie is there, he'll bite your giant ears off if you do." Irene yawned. "I gotta sleep, it's really late over here so… Tell 'Becca I said hi. Goodnight…"

Zamasu was kind of expecting Irene to call him a name, but she didn't. "Bye." She made a sound of acknowledgement, and then hung up finally leaving the Kaioshin alone with his plate of strawberries. He placed Rebecca's phone on the kitchen counter and looked at the red ceramic plate. Irene was eating the same exact fruits as he was.

Just the thought of that could have deterred him from eating any more strawberries, but it didn't because Zamasu loves food. Besides, there weren't that many strawberries on his plate right now… only about a few dozen. The Kaioshin had absentmindedly arranged the strawberries while he was on the phone with Irene, and they now looked like a small red hill of deliciousness.

 _...Maybe there was a bit more than a few dozen._

But hey, that's perfectly fine because there was a lot of them in her fridge at the moment. So it wouldn't hurt to eat a whole _tiny_ hill of them, right? Zamasu took the bowl into the living room and sat down on the couch, peacefully eating a few strawberries as he unpaused (yes, he learned how to do that too, in the time span of Rebecca not being awake) the movie.

To no surprise, the two dogs came downstairs, and seeing that he had a full plate of freshly picked-from-Rebecca's-large-garden strawberries somehow attracted the dogs to sit next to him. Ollie sat to his right, while Loki sat to his left, both their eyes following every strawberry that makes its way into his mouth. Zamasu noticed this and at first figured they were just wanting to be in his company, but then he intuitively realized their actual motives.

He was holding up a strawberry in one hand while looking between the two, just about to eat it. The pug and the malamute were both looking between the strawberry and the Kaioshin, and Zamasu sighed. "This is all for me, you know."

Not only does Zamasu have to deal with Ollie's adorable pouty face, but now he was introduced to Loki's downcast face, and the malamute was looking at him with an endearingly sad face. The Kaioshin pursed his lips, there were two pairs of brown eyes from two innocent beings, both of which wanted strawberries and because this was all for Zamasu, they were now pouting and low-key pleading him for strawberries. Nope, he wasn't gonna fall for it, he'd rather allow them to get their own treats instead.

After about a minute, which was the _longest known time_ that the Kaioshin resisted the pouty face of a dog let alone _two of them_ , he broke again.

"Alright… _Fine_ , you two can eat with me."

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Little bit of science for you guys here; blue light emits a higher frequency than orange light, and the scanners do have a dielectric heating feature about them due to the types of laser colors they use, which involves using high frequency emissions to heat up objects.**

 **It is way too late in the story to say this, but if you thought these OCs were supposed to be one-dimensional,** _ **well that ain't happening here**_ **. We're both dealing with two similar but very different people, and both are the same for different reasons. Dwell on that for a minute, Rebecca doesn't show dissent to humans just because she's observed them the same way Zamasu has.**

 **Rebecca can only view Jay and Adrian's aversion as them disliking her, however when Adrian spoke with Rebecca, you'd see he had considered Rebecca's job and actually didn't want to affect her ability to work at all. But Rebecca herself didn't think on behalf of her job and the curfew that she has, that says a little something.**

 **Anyways, hope you guys are having an awesome ass day, or night or evening or something. See yas in the next chapter! :]**


	18. Just His Damned Luck

**Zamasu could have caught a break… but he really can't.**

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 **Just His Damned Luck**

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It turns out that not only did Rebecca sleep for more than two hours, she slept until _3AM in the morning_. And when she woke up, the doctor had gotten up in a start; she shot up, not even looking at the time, took a shower and wore some fresh clothes because she legitimately slept in her work attire, and opened her door quickly. She fast walked through the hallway, not making any disruptive sounds, and quickly paced downstairs thinking that no one was there.

The Kaioshin knew all of this, because he was reading a book in the living room and could hear her walking around upstairs because of how silent her house was when almost everyone is asleep. It confused him as to why she took a shower so early, and why she was moving around so fast, but he kept quiet until she had came around on the stairs and stopped in her tracks. She looked surprised for some odd reason too, her hair was still a little damp and very disheveled and she was completely bare faced.

"Hello there." Zamasu decided to cut the silence with a quiet greeting because he didn't want to wake up the dogs. Her dogs were asleep in their rooms, Ollie decided to sleep right next to his big-little brother Loki in his room and both dogs were in a deep slumber.

"Hey… um." She approached him slowly, holding the edges of her cardigan. "Good morning, I guess. I didn't expect you to be down here, I thought you were in your room." A small chuckle as she sat down on the other side of the couch away from him.

Zamasu knew she was a quiet person, but Rebecca would normally come really close to him for no apparent reason. Now, she was sitting on the other side of the couch for no reason. It made him raise a brow, she looked like she didn't expect, and really _did not want_ , him to be down here. Once again, he figured she was hiding something.

But he wouldn't press such a thing on her abruptly. "I would have been up there, but I decided to stay here and read." He lowered his book and looked at her.

"Oh." She smiled, folding her hands on her lap and slightly leaning back and forth. "Well umm, how have you been?"

"I'm fine." Zamasu could see that she was still really tired. Even though she's been asleep since yesterday afternoon the Kaioshin could tell her sleep was restless, her eyes weren't that red but the way she was even sitting was showing that she still needed sleep. "Why are you up so early?"

Rebecca looked at him. "I've been asleep since 4 or something yesterday. A good 11 hours of sleep is too much." It didn't even feel like 11 hours of sleep rather it was more like eight or seven. Rebecca had spent a lot of that time just laying in her bed, crying over things she refused to address and thinking about things she ought not to think about in front of anyone else. But Zamasu didn't need to know that, nor did he probably care anyway. "So it would be reasonable to wake up at this time, no?"

He slowly nodded. "You still look tired. Rather restless." Looking down at the page number he was on, Zamasu closed his book and placed it on the coffee table. He looked back at her green eyes, and his own narrowed. "Is there something wrong?"

"Mmm… no." She shook her head. "There's nothing wrong. I've just been fine." Another tiny chuckle and the woman looked down at her lap, rubbing the back of her head. Rebecca figured that he was asking that because of both her sudden awakening, and because of the way she was speaking. It's hard to mask something in front of an intuitive, telepathic God of Creation, that ought to be damn near _impossible_.

"You've _just been_?" Zamasu frowned. She just nodded quietly. "I don't see that at all."

The doctor kept her face downcast, but looked up at him. He blinked, and Rebecca furrowed her brows and tilted her head for a split second. Then she looked back down and shook her head dismissively. "I just… can't sleep."

"Why can't you sleep?"

A pause. Then a tiny smile overcame her features and she waved her hand. "It's nothing, really. I'm just tired and I can't sleep."

It's not that the Kaioshin necessarily _cared_ for her wellbeing, he will swear that up and down if someone ever asks him, but he found her inability to let things out very irritating. Coupled with the fact that she came downstairs and sat with him looking as restless as ever, and decides to keep him guessing when such a vibe is _pouring_ out of her; it was annoying at best. Even when she'd joke around with him and giggle warmly, he'd still get the vibe that she was an overfilled enclosed bottle that needed to be opened before it explodes.

"It's not nothing." His voice was much more adamant, more stern and less calm than it was before. "You came downstairs and purposely sat near me instead of staying upstairs, or just leaving our exchange after simple greetings." A pause. "Something is making you uncomfortable."

And he can't pinpoint exactly what it is, because Rebecca is very good at controlling her thoughts. Which is why whatever is bothering her isn't making her react viscerally in front of him, it might be due to her _knowing_ that Zamasu can read minds which is why her thoughts are so tight locked. Had she had let her mind go a bit looser, he could've seen that she was emotional from what had took place yesterday; finding a weird black box that was laced with hazardous powder, being poisoned, seeing many of her fellow nurses and doctors show concern for her, and somehow… something having to do with him.

But he didn't know any of that. And Rebecca would rather he'd not know that she was crying and a bit heartstruck, she didn't want him to deal with that. "Well, it's just lethargy. It's weird… my bed is the most comfortable thing on the planet but… I was still feeling cold."

She was holding herself gently, both hands barely grasping her elbows because they were resting on her sides. To anyone it looks like a normal pose, but Zamasu could see that she was still cold, and this wasn't just physical. It was beyond that, Rebecca needed warmth that didn't necessarily require a blanket and some shuteye. She looked so trouble that due to his high intuition, it would have started to rub off on Zamasu had he been more sensitive.

Technically, he is already sensitive, but not in a sense of exacting other people's feelings. He could hear and see excellently, hundreds of times better than any human being in their history, but when it came to empathizing on a way of taking on another person's feelings, he could consciously choose not to do so. Not that it's hard for him to actually empathize, it's just that the Kaioshin didn't have much to do with any of that mainly because whatever mental struggles anyone in his caliber was going through were already fixed or being fixed rather quickly. With a human being, such a thing isn't so universal; they have a harder time trying to fix what they think.

And the individual in front of him was having the _absolute most_ difficult time with this, and it conflicting because it may seem like her controlling her thoughts was actually a good thing. It didn't take long for Zamasu to figure out that her way of repressing bad thoughts was basically her pushing her problems away, or trying to, making them build up and they either show in her emotions or through her actions. He hasn't seen her _do_ anything particularly off yet, but with Rebecca sitting in front of him like this… it really irked him.

"You're cold?" It wasn't really a question to be frank, Zamasu did not like the vibe she was giving off. He had the urge to get rid of it.

"Yeah… umm," She moved a little closer to him, and Rebecca's mouth kep opening and closing, trying to construe her sentence. Finally, her words came out slowly, but in a way that showed that they seemed to ooze out of her. "I don't… want to sleep alone."

Zamasu nodded, and the look the excellent doctor gave him screamed a want, a _need_ for close proximity, for physical closeness. She yearned for something to hold that didn't happen to be a pillow or one of her dogs, but he looked closer. She looked so _doubtful_ , as if she was questioning whether or not she really needed such a thing when it was written all over her face. Now that her body language was being uncovered so early in the morning, he understood why she was always so touchy with him throughout the past few days. Since he's the only sapient being in her house that could speak and think similarly as her, it became a catalyst for her actions or something.

She wasn't moving any closer to him because he could see that she was second guessing what she really wanted, so he fought against the aversion to proximity and moved towards her because her hesitance was getting irritating. He now sat right next to her, extending his arm behind her back and pulling her closer until her head rested on the front of his shoulder.

Rebecca blinked several times almost in disbelief. Zamasu knew that she simply wanted someone by her side for the night, but she didn't think that he would actually… _touch_ her. Not only that but he didn't pull her in close and released his hand from her waist, he _kept his hand_ there, and he kept her head on his upper chest. She was trying to comprehend what thought process he went through to do this, and she slowly wrapped both her arms around his waist and pulled herself into him.

He was… _warm_. His body was comfortable against hers, and she closed her eyes. Maybe it's because it's been a _fucklong_ amount of time since she'd cuddle a man, like intimately, this was remotely the closest to intimacy that she could get and it felt good. It feels nice to be close to someone, and she had completely forgotten what that felt like.

The last person she's done this with was Adrian, that was many years ago. The other boyfriend she had during college was another man she had done this with, but that was an abusive relationship. She couldn't count anything positive that other man had done because he was nothing but bad news to her, and Adrian was the only man who didn't fuck her over. She was young, she was reckless, she was arrogant and ignorant back then, she ended up hurting him real bad. And even when she slept with a bunch of his friends a few years ago, there was no actual intimacy in the sex. It was just a filler, just two parties doing something for their own benefit, and the fact that she could entice many men gave her a lot of control. The only person she didn't touch at the time was Jay, and she felt compelled _not_ to seduce him, but that didn't mean she didn't affect him in one way or another.

She became friends with his ex. Her ex had went through his personal documents at one point and Rebecca helped her to exact 'revenge' on Jay. Rebecca didn't think that she'd end up taking _hundreds of thousands of dollars in his bank account_ , and at the time that was a large portion of Jay's income. He didn't go bankrupt, but he did have to close that account due to his money being poured out for his ex's use, and after that the woman didn't speak to or of him again. That was what she did to him, and that particular incident was one of the times where she'd second-guess her actions. Lexi didn't know about what she had done, or maybe she _does_ know, but they're still close friends even though Jay wanted little to nothing to do with her. The incident angered Irene even, that was when she decided she had to change. That was the day when she broke down and cried in front of no one because she felt like it was pathetic, like her choices and her actions and her behavior were all pathetic. She didn't think of what either Adrian or Jay felt, she just did what she did because she figured that they wouldn't feel anything because they hated her. It somehow made sense back then to her but now that she looked back at it, Adrian was hurt the absolute most by her actions. She promised herself that she'll allow herself to open up and to become closer to the people who cared about her. Fast forward to now and she found that she was still alone, she was still afraid to let go of things because she thought that certain things still made up who she was.

Rebecca looked up a little, just enough to see Zamasu's jawline. "...Zamasu?" He looked down at her, grey eyes to green. "Do you mind staying with me? You can read your book while I'm next to you. I kind of… don't want to be alone."

This was the first time she's ever said that. The weight of those words could be heard clearly, because her voice was borderline cracking when she said that last sentence.

Zamasu could feel the hollowness in her person because of the fact that she had no one else near her for so long. The Kaioshin nodded, and he teleported the both of them, including his book, to her room, an action reminiscent of what happened yesterday. He placed her down on her bed and sat next to her, she still kept her body close to him as if the whole room went cold. He kept his hand against her waist and the other holding his book up, using his thumb to open to the book to the right page. Rebecca's head rested on his upper chest, one hand was behind him and the other was against his upper abdomen.

There were no words for a while, Zamasu thought that she had fallen asleep within minutes until she had said something in a very low and quiet voice. "This doesn't… bother you, does it?"

In truth, it didn't. In truth, there was nothing wrong with what he was doing, and he had figured that out while she was close to him. Sure, it felt unfamiliar, but it didn't feel _bad_. But he didn't straight up answer her. "What did bother me was that you were sitting in front of me wanting something and not saying anything at all." He wasn't yelling at her, his tone was pliant. "I don't like that."

She chuckled. "I didn't think that you'd…"

She ended up trailing off and he spoke for her. "I did that because I am highly intuitive. Your vibe was irritating to me."

"So to fix it, you decided to hold me?" She looked up at him.

"That is what you wanted." He looked down at her. "And this was the only thing that'd make it go away."

His explanation was nothing short of logical, and she could see that there was no emotional involvement behind why he decided to sit here with her. He just did it because that was what she _needed_ , nothing more or nothing less. For some reason, figuring that out made her feel a bit warmer inside. That same cold feeling she had been feeling was starting to diminish. She started to snuggle into him, feeling far too comfortable to break away and object to her own thoughts. Zamasu could feel her hand pressing a bit more into his abdomen and her face was now resting snugly against his chest.

"Thank you…" Was the last thing she managed to say before she had fallen asleep on him, leaving Zamasu awake and spending his time casually reading until she would finally wake up again later on in the day. He looked down at the doctor below him, her sleeping face was peaceful, and the worry and frustration that resided in her had faded just as fast as it came.

 **U** **U** **U** **U** **U** **U** **U** **U** **U** **U**

Six hours later, Zamasu had slowly shifted himself off of Rebecca's petite resting body, moving her hands and head to her pillow. He could have left much earlier, but he found her bed to be really comfortable when he was reading so he stayed pretty darn long. She made a noise feeling him move away, though she stayed fast asleep from his subtle movements.

 _This was basically what happened in the morning; He left her room, going downstairs and making himself a cup of tea. At this time, Ollie and Loki were both awake and they jubilantly ran down the stairs seeing Zamasu in the kitchen. They both grabbed their respective food bowls, and went to a dog food dispenser in her kitchen taking turns in serving themselves with dog food._

 _Zamasu raised a brow. "You two had food already made and yet you wanted pancakes from me?" He squinted as the dogs barked happily at him, obviously they just wanted pancakes from him before, but he seriously thought that they didn't have any means of eating while Rebecca was gone._

 _The Kaioshin approached the two, rubbing both their heads with a smile on his face. He then stood back up and went into the living room and sat on the couch, deciding to turn on the TV again. He had finished his book already, and that was the last book that he had found within her house. He tapped the power button, and then looked through the channels, as Rebecca did teach him certain things a couple days ago according to this, so he knew how to flip through channels. After a few taps, he heard her voice upstairs, she was probably talking on the phone._

 _Rebecca came downstairs several minutes later. Her hair wasn't damp anymore and she was now wearing a white shirt with shorts. She was holding her phone in her hand and was still talking to whoever she was talking to, at this time Zamasu was busy pouring himself some tea. He looked at the doctor, frowning when he realized that she more than likely had to go to work much earlier than now._

" _Good morning." He gave her a simple greeting._

 _Rebecca was walking into the kitchen as he said that. "Good morning." She gave him a small, rushed smile, and turned and went behind him to the fridge._

 _That was it. That was all she said. He was expecting more words out of her, but those were the only two so far. He sparked up an important question. "You don't have work today?"_

 _The redhead was bent over looking into the fridge. "I have a day off today and tomorrow because of certain incidents. I already don't have to work on Sunday so I'll be free for three days."_

 _She said that with no other conviction, her voice was a matter-of-factly timbre. A nod, and Zamasu raised a brow. She didn't say anything else, she got whatever she wanted to eat, which was a fruit bowl, and quietly, almost briskly asked him if he wanted some and he didn't mind. She made him a separate bowl and when he went into the living room, she went into the dining room with hers. The whole time, she had the most pensive face he'd ever seen from her. Zamasu sat down quietly, choosing not to get involved with whatever she was thinking about._

That was a few hours ago. It was late in the afternoon, and he was in his room sitting in the small lounge-esque area. The Kaioshin hadn't spoke to her ever since, he had played around with Ollie and Loki earlier as the two got well-situated with him in mere days, and then went to his room to do something else.

And that something else was him changing the colors of his infinity table because it was interesting, he was bored, and that's totally something a mature God would do. Don't judge him, that's his job, sort of.

He heard the doorbell ring downstairs and soon after he heard muffled voices downstairs since his door was closed. The Kaioshin continued looking at the screen that enables him to change the table's lights, and he selected green and a rosy pink hue. He watched as the lights transitioned from ivory white to the two selected colors, seeing them fade in and out one after another. Zamasu watched intently, who would've known that rose pink and green went so well together.

"Zamasu!" He heard Rebecca call his name out and he assumed that this was just the woman calling him to meet whoever was at the door, which was an action reminiscent of what Irene used to do. He shook his head, he hated that woman with a _passion._

Zamasu stood up from his seat on the floor in front of a table that lights up because once again, that's really mature, and opened his door to exit. He walked through the corridor, feeling the soft durable carpet against his bare feet. Yes, he had finally gotten comfortable enough to take off his boots and walk around with his beautiful godly feet exposed, and he had to say that it didn't feel bad at all. Taking his steps down the stairs, he saw Ollie running in and out of his sight and Loki's yipping down at the living room, which pretty much shows that whoever was at the door was someone they were really comfortable with. He was looking down at the floor as he walked down the steps and when his feet touched the living room floor, he had finally got a clear sight of Rebecca and the visitor that was in her living roo-

 _No_. Zamasu stopped mid-stride to look at the person, the _woman,_ that was laughing with Rebecca because she said something. She was wearing an off-shoulder romper tracksuit that hugged the feminine curves of her body, it was in a dark camo print, and her shoes were simple black kitten heels. She was holding a brown decorated bag laced around her elbow. Her brown-highlighted hair was pulled over to one side, covering her face from his view. This same woman who sat next to him back at the airport, who made him feel utterly uncomfortable back then was here right now, and he would swear up and down, left and right, _diagonally_ even, that he gotten over the feeling that she gave him but apparently… _There is no way… this can't be happening_.

"Zamasu, Lexi's here! I'm pretty sure you guys met at the airport before so… I reckon he's cool with you." She turned to Lexi and at that last sentence and she nodded. And then that woman turned and looked at him…

 _Oh for Kami's sake, she's not even wearing makeup and she looks even better without it!_ Zamasu could have groaned out loud if he wasn't greatly self-aware. _This is the absolute worst_. Lexi approached him with a warm smile, and he swore that her face kept getting more and more brighter as she got closer. "Hey Zamasu- wait you don't do hugs?"

Her arms were outstretched and he blinked. Perhaps he should have wore his boots before he came downstairs. "Uhh…" He just looked down at her arms and he accidentally accepted her question. What is language again? "I don't mind." Since when the hell did he accept _hugs_ from _humans_? What is wrong with him?! Lexi smiled and she hugged him, the Kaioshin's body became stiffer than a tree. He didn't move because not only was her body really comfortably warm, but she smelled _exquisitely good_ once again, not like violets but she smelled like _goddamned jasmine_.

He had nowhere else to look so he just looked down at the ground somewhere for the two very long seconds that she hugged him, and when she pulled away a small subdued part of him almost didn't want her to. "Hello."

Lexi raised her hand. "I'm sorry, I'm sure I probably drowned you with the perfume I'm wearing. I kinda put too much before I came here."

 _ **Too much is not enough…**_ Where did that come from? "It doesn't bother me."

Rebecca blinked between the two, and then she looked at Lexi. "How did you put too much perfume? You usually do like two spitzes and that's it."

It's true; Lexi was the type of woman who didn't use much perfume because she didn't really need to but today was an exception. "I was spraying it on and the nozzle thingy stopped working properly so I tried to open it, and a lot of it spilled on me."

An _accidental_ exception.

Rebecca chuckled. "Are you serious? I mean, I don't think it's too much. It still smells divine, to be honest."

No, Rebecca didn't purposely use that word because Zamasu was there, that's just how Lexi's perfume smelled. Because if Rebecca said that it smelled divine, and Zamasu in his divine self was right there, then that means that the doctor somehow saw his weird reaction to her being here and therefore would conclude that something strange was going on in his head.

Was it mentioned that Zamasu was a terrible overthinker?

Lexi looked down with that same pretty smile. "Thanks. I did bring stuff for you and Zamasu by the way." She went into her bag and Rebecca raised her hands.

"Wait, I want you to get situated first. Come, sit." She beckoned her friend to sit down on the sectional couch with her. She and Lexi sat on the side facing the stairs and Zamasu purposely sat on the side facing the TV because _no_ , he's not sitting next to her again. It's not that she was a person he hated, it's because sitting next to her, being physically close to her makes him second guess things, and he'd rather not second guess anything about humanity at the moment. That would be strange.

"So, this is for you." Lexi pulled out a small, white elegant box with a see-through top.

"Is it food again?" Rebecca narrowed her eyes at Lexi with a smile.

"Maybe." The model smirked and handed her the box, of which Rebecca looked down at with wide eyes.

"Coconut macaroons?!" She looked back at Lexi. "Dude, I've been craving these for a while now!"

"Really?" Lexi still had her hand in the bag, as there was one more item that she had to get out. "You've got cravings too?"

"Yeah, like the day before, I was at the hospital eating some food from the cafeteria and I started eating my fries with pickles." Lexi frowned and Rebecca shrugged. "I dunno! It just tasted good at the moment."

"Oooh, geez, you know what means…" She knowingly gave her friend a look, and looked down at the bag. "I was eating prior to coming here, which is why I bought you guys food so… you can thank me later. Zamasu…" She was reaching in for what she bought for him, and out came a fancy matte black box that was wide and not so tall. There was a rich-rose colored ribbon around it, and the corners had a single gold line that was parallel to the diagonal parts of the box. There was cursive script written for the brand name on top, and the box's texture was so smooth and luxurious, Zamasu could just stare at the beautiful packaging of this box.

He lifted it up, blinked, and cocked his neck back as if he was looking at some math equation with no numbers. "...Am I supposed to _open_ this?"

Lexi giggled. Her damned giggle sounded so pleasing to his ears and he hated it. Or he didn't hate it, he really didn't know. "Yes. Rebecca told me that you liked chocolates so I bought you chocolates."

"This box has chocolates in it?" Now the Kaioshin wanted to open this box, but he didn't know where to start. "How does one… do this?"

"Just cut the ribbon and pull the top off. Do you need a scissor?" Lexi was looking around for something sharp, but Zamasu already sliced the ribbon by the time she looked back at him. " _Oh…_ how'd you do that?"

"He's got a spirit sword in his hand." Rebecca uses the _best_ possible words to describe his abilities. He shook his head. "It's a long story."

"Good. Keep it at that." Zamasu looked at her with a stern face, and Rebecca smiled. He held the side of the top and lifted it up slowly, feeling it slide up and out of the bottom and- "Oh… _Oh_." There sat a wide assortment of different types of rich chocolates right in front of him. Some were milky, some were dark, some were truffles, some were malts, some were colored and some had cherry fillings in it and some were mint chocolate. Zamasu swallowed, there was so much _goodness_ in this box, he didn't even know where to start with this.

"That's a _chocolatier's_ box." Rebecca pointed at the wide box. "It damn near looks like a table."

Lexi nodded. "It's a Chocolatier's Table. I went overboard, it might be too much for you to eat right now, Zamasu."

 _ **Perhaps you should eat them with me then**_ \- Seriously, where are these thoughts coming from? He slowly nodded, still looking down at the table of _divine deliciousness_ with a slowly growing smile. "I think I'll be fine."

"Expected of him." Zamasu shot Rebecca a look, and then he looked back down at the chocolates.

"You two look like you bicker a lot." Lexi folded the bag and placed it to her side.

Rebecca shook her head. "Listen, Zamasu is the type of guy that'll make you bicker with him."

The Kaioshin returned his gaze back to her. "As far as I know, I never instigate any kind of argument. She does."

"But that's as far as you know."

"If you _dare_ …" He raised his finger at her, because he didn't want her to bring back that _mindfuck_ of a conversation.

"Okay fine, I won't." Rebecca raised her hands, and Lexi finally laughed at the exchange between the two. The doctor looked at the model. "So, you called me earlier to tell me you had some exciting news."

"Right, I did." Lexi bounced a little in her seat with an excited smile on her face. "I could have said it over the phone but I wanted to see the babies too."

She was referring to the two dogs who are now strolling around the living room and kitchen. The Kaioshin closed his box and felt the cover around his hand as he looked back at the two women talking. Lexi was saying something about her having to do this thing called a 'runway', which he didn't understand what that meant, but she looked really elated telling her his news. He watched how her facial expressions would change from ranges of alacrity and certitude, she had a cute smile on her face that would either get bigger or smaller, but it was always there. They were busy giving each other news on one another's life, both of them were positively talking and laughing, and Lexi's laugh sounded beautiful. It had this ring to it that made it sound authentic and hearty just like her voice, and when she'd laugh she would lean forward and cast her head down, making her hair move and sway with her. Her eyes were soft, her smiles were bright, and she sat there, poised and full of femininity-

"Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin in question blinked like a deer caught in headlights. "...What?" Lexi raised her brown eyebrows and the Kaioshin was low-key hoping, with all Kami's might, that she didn't perceive what he was doing. Hell, he didn't even know why he was still sitting here, listening to two women talk about their lives and staring at one of them so damn intently-

"Are you alright over there?" Rebecca had her arm leaning against the top of the couch, her finger barely brushing her mouth. "You kinda spaced out."

"I'm okay."

His quick response made her furrow her brows. "You don't usually do that."

"Beware, Rebecca's starting to rub off on you." Lexi smirked, and Rebecca playfully punched her toned arm.

The doctor looked down at the model's arm. "Geez, your arms _feel_ strong."

Lexi looked down. "I may be a model, but I've been training for quite a while."

Zamasu blinked. _Training?_

"Thanks to your boyfriend." Rebecca chuckled, and Zamasu's interest was piqued, especially when Rebecca's eyes flickered towards him. "How is he, by the way?"

"He's been great, we're probably gonna do something special tomorrow. It is Saturday, ya know." Lexi's hands were on her thighs. "And you two are coming with us."

Rebecca frowned. "Wait wait, what do you mean by special?"

"I mean that you, me, and the rest of the group are gonna do something tomorrow. Since you didn't get a chance to join us at the bar, I thought you could come through tomorrow. You aren't busy as far as I know."

Rebecca smiled. It seems like she's been getting more positive things her way ever since… yesterday. For some reason, the galena poisoning she had felt like two days ago. Her side effects were completely gone later on yesterday, and she's more than well-rounded to hit up the plans of whatever Lexi was talking about. It's not surprising that the model was the person to propose such things to her, _because everyone else seriously couldn't_.

"I'd love to join. I just gotta ask, what is it all about?"

"It's just us hanging out throughout the day because we have nothing else to do." Lexi chuckled. "It's not something that's planned, it's just more of a kick-it day."

"Oh, well still I'd like to hang out with you guys." And by 'you guys', she meant Lexi and Zamasu because they're the only two individuals she could talk to.

Lexi nodded. "What about you, Zamasu? You wanna join us?"

The Kaioshin weighed his options; he could stay here in his comfortable room with two beloved dogs sauntering around the mansion, or he could be watching movies _all day_ while Rebecca was out with her friends. But if it was Rebecca who asked him to join, he probably would have said no, he would have decided to spend his time reflecting and thinking and reading and watching things, playing games with both Ollie and Loki. But apparently, he was struggling with the stupid question, not because the decision was difficult in itself, but because of _who_ directed the question to him.

It has definitely nothing to do with the fact that Lexi was looking at him with kind eyes, and that she genuinely wanted Zamasu's company which made him feel even more weird. And it definitely doesn't involve him looking at her pretty face and at her soft brown eyes… the nature of this situation became reminiscent of Ollie's pudgy face whenever the pug wanted something from him. But this time, Lexi wasn't pleading to him at all, he literally just found it hard to say _no_ to this particular woman.

He broke, unfortunately. Maybe. "I don't mind." He realized that this woman was the first _human_ to make him lenient.

"Great!" She clapped. Part of him was wondering how she didn't manage to catch the drift of his actions so to speak, but the majority was him was very thankful that she didn't. "I just wanna let you know, from what Irene told Jay and according to that, a lot of the stuff we might do kinda seem really stupid. But we can't help it, we like having fun."

"Fun?" Rebecca gave her a look. "This morning, you sent me a video of Jay and some of his Japanese friends going on joyrides at _3 AM_." It was ironic, because Rebecca had awaken at that time too.

The model held her hands up. "It was in his own car, okay."

"Yeah, sure, but he was doing _150_. You almost gave me a heart attack."

Lexi giggled. "Well, I'm fine now aren't I? I told him not to do it but ya know… guys like him like 'testing the waters', in his words." She made quotation gestures in the air.

It's funny because Lexi was probably one of the most adventurous women she knew in her lifetime. She could literally be someone's spirit animal with how much energy, strength and foolhardiness she has. Her whole life motive was legitimately 'testing the waters' at its finest. "As long as you're not speeding over empty routes tomorrow, I think Zamasu would be fine. Besides, he's living with me. He hadn't seen enough stupidity."

"I digress." Zamasu raised a hand, and Rebecca scowled at him, proceeding to throw a pillow at him playfully and he caught it with ease. "You don't throw pillows at a God."

"A god?" Lexi frowned. Oh no, he's gonna have to explain this even more to another person again. Since when did talking about his _godliness_ become recursively boring?

"Well, he is. The guy can summon stuff, he's telekinetic, he can teleport and fly and shit like that." Rebecca was making gestures describing his powers, and Lexi looked on with wide eyes.

"Ya know what, if I need to go somewhere and if you're near me, I might just ask you to teleport me to where I need to be." The model chuckled, and Zamasu could only look down and shake his head with a faint smirk. The idea of this woman having to _touch_ him was something he didn't want to think about. That was the only reason why he shook his head, and it has nothing to do with her being dirty.

Rebecca narrowed her eyes, this green guy has been acting weird. It can't be that he had been spending a long time outside of socializing because he acts perfectly fine around her. The only catalyst for this behavior, and being a woman Rebecca caught it quickly, was her good friend Lexi. Just knowing this made her smirk as she looked at the model. "If he doesn't do that, I'll force him to."

She brandished a toothy grin and Zamasu gave her a light scornful look. "I will lift you above the ground and spin you around again."

"The hell? You lifted her off the ground once?" Lexi looked shocked and Rebecca shook her head in recalling.

"He did, because I tapped his nose."

Okay, the way she worded that made it sound like _he_ was in the wrong for the action. "You don't just _tap my nose_. It's weird, why would you tap someone's nose of all places?"

"It's kind of a playful thing." The model giggled at his unfamiliarity, and Rebecca noticed that he got quiet for some reason. "I do the same thing to Jay and his friends in general or when they say something stupid."

He genuinely didn't know that. Like a genius, he thought that Rebecca was just exhibiting this weird act to annoy him, he didn't know humans normally did this to one another. "Oh."

Rebecca couldn't keep the smirk on her face from leaving.

"Just remind me not do that because I don't wanna get lifted and thrown across a room like The Conjuring." Lexi raised her hands with a smile on her face.

Zamasu shook his head. "As long as you don't annoy me." What he meant to say that he actually never would do that to her, but he had to set barriers here. Like seriously, they've been breaking, melting, pulverizing and dying down for the past _ever_. He had to do that and give off the impression that he would give her no promises.

Even though he didn't realize that he'd end up getting her much closer to him than he could ever realize.

"I won't. But wait," She moved closer to him and he leaned back, "Why don't you show me your powers? But not _on me_ though, just like… over there somewhere."

The Kaioshin looked down at his hand and decided that he'd materialize something. There were many things that he could conjure up without expelling so much energy, but he opted for something really, really light. For any object, all he had to do was know of its existence and that was all he needed to materialize whatever it was. Maybe he should do a flower or something, that was simple. He mentally picked a random flower, deciding on jasmine because it was the first thing that came to his mind. There were shiny purple particles that fluttered around his hand, and within seconds a healthy, bright and vibrant jasmine was in his hands.

The model gasped. "Oh my god, that's so pretty! Well, I mean 'my gosh' actually, pardon." Lexi stood up to approach him and take the sweet little jasmine out of his hands. Zamasu blinked thrice, _well..._

You know what's funny? That's the first flower he thought of, and guess what? Lexi was wearing a stupid perfume that smelled just like friggin jasmine! It's even funnier because for some reason, that was seriously the first thing he thought of… or _was it?_ Maybe this really beautiful woman was influencing his thought process too.

"It even matches the flower of the perfume that you're wearing!" Rebecca looked on, shocked because this was the first time she had actually witnessed Zamasu summon something.

Lexi smiled at him. "Aww, did you do that on purpose?"

 _I swear on Kami, I didn't do that on purpose_. He could swear left and right, up and down, diagonally, _haphazardly_ , all the possible third and fourth dimensional directions that what he just did was a complete accident. "I didn't think of your perfume when I created that."

That seemed so damned guilty, and he hoped the two weren't gonna beat the truth out of him _like they can_. He could have just said no; _ugh_ they're were so many opportunities for him to avoid feeling like an idiot, yet he evaded _all of them_ like a genius. _Stupendous._

" _Wow_. Can I keep it?" Lexi held it close to her chest, and Zamasu just nodded. "Oh, thank you! It's really pretty, I love it."

 _ **You're really pre-**_ _What. Is wrong. With me?_

Rebecca smiled. "That's really sweet of you. Really thoughtful." Rebecca stood up, she had spent half an hour sitting and talking with Lexi and Zamasu and she had to stretch her legs. "Do you wanna eat something?"

"I ate before I came here. I told you this already, but if you wanna feed me again then… I'm all up for it." Lexi shrugged, and Rebecca smirked.

"Eh, I'll get something for all of us. I didn't even open my macaroons yet, I'll get to those when you leave. You two can just sit tight while I fix up a thing, I'll take your box and put it in the fridge, Zamasu." Without any hitch, Rebecca took his chocolate box table and went into her kitchen, leaving Zamasu and Lexi alone.

 _Oh hell no_ , now she was closer to him and they were alone in a room. What was he supposed to do? Lexi looked at him. "I am really curious and I hope I'm not being somewhat snoopy, but does every single like, god have those abilities?"

It's a good thing she brought up a topic he can comfortably talk about, but it didn't help because it was _Lexi_ for crying out loud. "The Kaioshin are the Gods of Creation, the ones who have mastered the sorts of powers Rebecca was talking about. So controlling any form of matter is pretty much expected of us."

"Expected?" The Kaioshin nodded. "So you weren't born with these powers, you had to learn them? Do gods even experience birth?" That last question was more towards herself rather than him.

Zamasu looked down at the his lap for reasons. "By default, we have those powers at a very basic level of expertise. Those who wish to become a Kaioshin, like me, would train and perfect their abilities and fighting skills."

"So you mean to tell me that your race is just born with superpowers?" She had a look of astonishment on her face. "That's friggin' crazy."

"There not really superpowers for us."

"Yeah I know, but there are a _really small_ amount of people that can do all that stuff. Not the whole materializing, conjure-up thing, but like telepathy and telekinesis and even flying, there is a small amount of people that can do that." Zamasu's interest was piqued up once again. A _human_ knowing how to do what he does? Since when? "You mentioned _fighting_ though, that's right up my alley."

Was there a memo for this? He thought every human was denser than a block of lead- "Wait, what do you mean by _up your alley_?"

Lexi giggled for a reason Zamasu didn't understand. That question... sounded wrong, now that he thought about it. "I mean, I myself am pretty good at fighting. Me and Jay spar oftentimes, and he's taught me a lot in the years we've been dating. There's so much stuff I can say but I don't wanna run-off into the deep end."

Zamasu could see that she was getting excited over talking about fighting, and he was interested in hearing what she had to say. "I do not mind. Continue." This was actually the first time where he encouraged a human to continue speaking to him. _Go figure._

"Oh. Umm," she looked down and smiled, and then back at him. "Well, I didn't start doing karate until the beginning of highschool, and I've been a blackbelt for mmm… I think 6 or so years, I believe?" He knew about the belt system in karate because well… he's _very knowledgeable_ in fighting and martial arts styles and can pretty much execute many of forms very well. He may be a dumbbell on knowing about human beings, but karate may as well be something he knew like the back of his hand.

Zamasu's was rather surprised to hear this. "Really?"

Lexi smirked and adorned a playful look. "Well I didn't get these legs and this strength for nothin', ya know."

None of those random out-of-place subconscious thoughts that'd pop their way into his head came by when she said that. Lexi didn't even look muscular; she was toned, but curvaceous at the same time. She didn't look like the type of woman that could chase and tackle down a six foot man after he steals her purse. That was still an incredibly unexpected feat of hers, especially because she always seemed well-pampered and didn't look as though she liked to sweat. But the woman had perks to her that made her athletic, and that made her even more attracti-

 _Stop thinking like that_! "What type of martial arts do you know?"

"Hmm, I know a few." _A few?_ If he was less self-critical, he'd have a field day with this information. Lexi was gesturing with her fingers while looking up accessing memory. "Taekwondo, Wushu, Judo, Jujitsu, uhh… Jeet Kune Do and Jay taught me this one style recently, it's Aikido-"

At this point, with every style she mentioned, the Kaioshin's eyes would increasingly get wider. "You said only a _few_!"

"Well _yea_ I mean… compared to how many actually exist at the moment, it's reasonably a few." She smiled. "And there's stuff that I learned to do outside of fighting from Jay. He taught me, and pretty much anyone he considers family with which is not a lot of people, how to control ki."

This is the part where Zamasu cocked his neck back, not because she was too close to him… okay, maybe partially because of that, but because of the fact that she knows about ki. He actually smirked. "Oh really?"

"Mm-hmm." She was elated to speak on this, and that intrigued Zamasu. Forget about the fact that she's already really beautiful…

He didn't forget that fact. He had just remembered it, unfortunately. But he won't dwell on that for now. "Show me."

Lexi raised her hand in front of the both of them, using it as a visual focus point. Obviously, he could tell she didn't have many years to really hone her ki. Sometimes, those who have mastered ki control may look at their hands, although they don't need to use it as a focus point as they can generate that ki through their hands without having to look due to spatial awareness. And also with people who have a lot of ki but don't know how to control it, they usually need a focus point so that their ki energy doesn't flare out somewhere they don't want it to be. He could tell that Lexi still needed to look at her hands before exacting ki.

A small energy ball formed in her hands, she kept the formless orb buoyant above her palm, it was about as big as her pinky finger. Lexi looked up at him. "See?"

Zamasu nodded, slightly _impressed_. If this was some normal human being he would have lambasted them for being granted such power knowing how horrible their species was, but with Lexi… he just saw it as an all-around positive. "I do. How long has he been teaching you?" He is certain that Jay was joining along with his girlfriend tomorrow. Zamasu had some _questions_ for him.

Lexi thought. "Umm, not that long. About several months or something."

Several months? And she executes it so well for some who has spent less than a year learning in coitus. He was absolutely impressed now. "Most people can't even control that much ki and keep it that stable in such a short amount of time. Impressive."

He actually fucking complimented someone. She smiled, her face downcast as she humbly took his compliment, and those idiot thoughts started coming back again considering her expression cute. "Thanks." The ki went away and she lowered her hand. She looked up at him with a smile, and Zamasu felt the urge to turn away.

"Umm…" Rebecca could be heard from the inside of the kitchen. "I could have sworn that I had extra strawberries to top these off with."

Lexi frowned. "Strawberries?"

"Yeah, I had a whole bunch of them in a large container. I picked them out like a few days ago." There was footsteps coming closer to the exit of the kitchen and Rebecca's head peeked out. She had a cross look on her face. " _Zamasu…"_

There was a reason why the Kaioshin was quiet through this exchange. It's obviously not because he ate all the strawberries but… it's close to that reason. "What is it?"

"Don't act all innocent." She then brandished the empty container that the genius Kaioshin left in the fridge. It wasn't actually empty, there was _one_ strawberry left so… "You finished all my damn strawberries!"

"Umm…" The box of chocolates hasn't even been eaten yet. He was looking down at the dogs. "Ollie and Loki ate them with me too. So, I wasn't the one who finished them all."

Because of the intuitive bond the God and the dogs had, the canines immediately started rebuking his statement with barks. Zamasu looked at the two of them and retracted the statement a little. "Okay fine, maybe I _partially_ helped in finishing them."

"Helped?"

"Yes."

"Meaning you were the one who took the strawberries out?" The doctor was pointing at him and he blinked.

"They wanted them too."

Ollie was biting Zamasu's pants again, and Loki furrowed his furry brows.

"Lexi…" Rebecca shook her head at her friend. "He's a really bad liar."

Lexi nodded. "I can see that." He could have given her a sour look but he can't because… he just can't. _Dammit._ "I mean, whatever you're making I can still eat regardless of the strawberries, you know."

"I know but… strawberries could have made it ten times better, but _someone_ had to eat all of them. I'll bring the froyos though, regardless." The accusative voice was apparent, and Lexi gave Zamasu the same cross look but in playful way. He looked away again and she giggled. That _stupid_ goddamned giggle, _ughhhh._

Rebecca returned to the living room with a plate of these weird white cubes with smiley faces on their sides. She placed the plate down on the table, and Zamasu got to see what these 'froyos' were all about.

"What are these?"

"It's basically frozen yogurt with a fruit inside." Lexi explained. "It tastes great, although I am a sucker for yogurt. Can't live without it."

The Kaioshin subconsciously kept note of that. "Oh. What fruit is in it?"

"Go ahead and take one to see." Rebecca gestured to the plate, and she and Lexi started talking about things as Zamasu picked up a froyo cube. He bit into it, feeling the cold, vanilla texture of the frozen yogurt and he raised his brows. It didn't give him foodgasms the way chocolate did but it was similar; frozen yogurt had a more endearing taste to him, something that he should have only a little bit of otherwise he'd spoil the goodness of it. Chocolate had the same effect on him, a sort of luxury that he can't find it in himself to exploit or indulge too much in. Coupled with the fact that there was a strawberry in it made the yogurt taste really good.

"Wait, what's point of topping these off with strawberries if there are strawberries in them?"

The women were in the middle of talking when he asked that. Rebecca tilted her head. "It _would've_ been a pretty garnish."

"Listen," Zamasu raised a hand, justifying his huge appetite for freshly grown, tasty things, "This still tastes fine without them."

"You know what, before we leave, he's gonna replant all my strawberries." Rebecca told Lexi in an outright, surefire tone. She completely evaded Zamasu's look. "Yup. I'm not going through that trouble again."

Zamasu was about to object, but he decided on something; technically, it was him that was going to plant strawberries which basically means that they were _his_ harvesting, which meant that he could just eat them all again. _Huh_ , no problem, he just nodded laconically. "Sure."

"Hmmph." Rebecca crossed her arms. There was a sudden ring coming from Lexi's pocket, and she looked down.

Lexi pulled out her phone to see Jay's caller ID. "It's Jay, hold on." She placed a little earpiece from her into her left ear, waved her hand where her bluetooth was. "Hey Jay… I'm good, I'm just with Zamasu and Rebecca."

Zamasu noticed a weird change in Rebecca's face when Lexi mentioned her name. It was as if Rebecca didn't want Jay to know that she was with his girlfriend. Her look left as quickly as it came. "Tell him I said hi."

"Okay… Rebecca says hi by the way…" she looked at her friend. "He says hi back. Same to you Zamasu." The Kaioshin nodded in regards, and Lexi smiled at whatever Jay was saying. "Yup, that's it. I'll see you later. Love you." She hung up, looking down at her phone with a warm smile.

Rebecca furrowed her brows. "You don't do kissy noises on the phone anymore?"

"It died out because we both started to hate it." She chuckled. "He just wanted to know where I was."

"That's really sweet. Worrisome kid." Rebecca smiled, her face was downcast.

"He's older than you, ya know."

"Only by _one year!_ " She raised her finger. "I'm just 25."

Lexi placed her phone into her pocket. "Girl, I'm the same age as you. But I'm not gonna lie, he's a kid sometimes."

Zamasu didn't think that they were young, but at the same time he didn't think they'd be that old. Does that make sense? For some reason, he thought Rebecca was a few years older than Irene, but she was only a year younger than her friend, perhaps even less so. No wonder why they were really stupid, especially Irene. She should know better, and he hated her for being so… feckless.

That might be the wrong word to describe Irene, as there are many horrible words he could associate with her. But he hated how she just never seemed to look serious at all, she doesn't seem to take anything seriously. She just laughs things off and it's rare to see her actually get upset and he didn't like how her dismissive sense of humor made her look so dense.

Well, she is dense. That's what she is, she's just stupid. And that's why she's with such a badly tempered man who dared to put his hands on him. That's why she's in a lowly relationship that focused around either kisses or sex, he can't imagine her comprehending intimacy without sexual involvement. That's why that woman got upset at him for telling her truth, straight to her face without Zamasu even realizing it, it's too bad that she's too emotionally invested in James to see that she has no grasp of closeness and intimacy. He despised her, that lambasted woman-

He felt Loki nudge him and he looked down at the malamute. Somehow, he figured that the malamute sensed his frustration and semi-anger. Loki leaned against his lap and Zamasu caressed his furry head, seeing his eyes slowly close and open. He was randomly reminded of that one time when a bird perched on his shoulder, and then flew away when he started thinking about humanity. This was different; Loki _approached_ him when he saw that the Kaioshin was getting upset. It was as if the malamute was trying to remind him of something but because he was a dog, such a reminder can't be well communicated because it was complex, so that _thing_ was incomprehensible. Even Ollie was back at it again, putting his paws against Zamasu's shoulders right after he hopped on the couch. The pug's tongue was out and his head was craned back because of his tiny neck.

Cute.

"Umm.. I'm getting messages from some coordinators. They'd like to speak to me in person about my clothing line." Lexi wasn't only a model; she was a fashion designer as well, she has her own clothing line. "Oooh, I wish I could stay longer but I can't. So… I probably gotta take my leave." She reluctantly got up, casually slipping her heels back on and smoothing out her jumpsuit.

See?! He's not the only one who does that. Rebecca smiled just as reluctantly, and she stood up to give her friend a hug. "Aww, it's fine. I know you're a busy bee." She pulled away still keeping her hands on Lexi's back and looking at her. "We still have tomorrow, by the way."

"You're right. I'll see you tomorrow." Lexi stepped to the side and ruffled her hair so that it was now freely flowing on her back. Zamasu looked up to see Lexi standing up, and he could swear that he just kept looking at the wrong times. "Zamasu? I'm leaving."

"Oh, umm…" He awkwardly raised his hand and goddamned waved, while she was standing _right in front of him_. "Goodbye."

She laughed. "I wanted to hug you but I dunno, I don't wanna make you uncomfortable."

Then Zamasu said those three infamous words that he'd find he'll be using a lot in the future. "I don't mind." He stood up slowly, looking down at Lexi as she approached and embraced him again.

The Kaioshin could still smell that sweet scent of jasmine on her person, and her hair smelled like… _green tea?_ Oh geez, it's a good thing he didn't notice that earlier because he now subconsciously was tilting his head into her hair in order to get a stronger whiff of the calming scent. His eyes were closed, and then they opened suddenly because he had realized there was someone else in the freaking room looking at the two of them. Lexi only hugged him for like two seconds and that felt like half a minute.

The two canines, just like their owner, were just looking on at the spectacle.

She broke away from him and gave him a sweet smile. "I'll see you tomorrow." Lexi walked past him and he still stood there while Rebecca went to the door with Lexi. They exchanged some more words before Rebecca opened the door and gave Lexi a final hug. When the model exited Rebecca looked back at the Kaioshin who had just now sat down, and slowly closed her door. She saw the way he was acting around Lexi, from the time she entered her house to her leaving just now, she saw how he spoke with her and how he barely kept eye contact with the woman.

Rebecca smirked. "I thought you said that you didn't like human women."

Zamasu frowned and looked at her. "I did say that. Human women do not interest me."

She tilted her head. "Then what was that?"

"What was what?" He answered _way too quickly_ , he already looked like he was getting defensive.

"All of that." Rebecca approached him. "You were acting _really weird_ when Lexi was here. Like, all throughout her fifty-ish minutes of being here." He was, he even knew that, but it's best to not let Rebecca know that because he himself doesn't know why he behaved that way. So he made up a short, elaborate lie to perfectly cover all the suspect behavior he had been exhibiting in the past hour.

"No, I wasn't."

It _was_ a short lie. You wouldn't expect a man like Zamasu to make up some shit on the spot because he's a shitty liar.

"Okay, sure shit." She sat down in front of him. "I saw every fucking thing, ya know. You were stiff when she hugged you and you just sat there _staring_ at her while she was talking to me. It's so obvious…"

"Well- what do you mean? What's so obvious?" He had no way to rebuke what she said because that was exactly what he was doing.

She dropped a question that would've raised the confusion going on inside of him. "You have a crush on her, don't you?"

"A what?"

It _would_ have, if he knew what that term meant prior to her saying it.

Rebecca sighed. "A crush is when you're infatuated with someone who isn't in your league, so to speak."

"I am not infatuated with that woman!" Was he? He didn't want to mentally question that.

"Dude, you _smelled_ her hair when she hugged you. That's not something some guy who doesn't like a woman does!"

He just made a 'hmmph' sound, crossing his arms and looking down at the ground ahead of him. "I don't like her."

"You don't like her?"

"No."

"Why?" Now she was crossing her arms, wanting to hear his reasoning for his feelings.

"Because she's human." The simplest, most expected answer quickly came out of him, and Rebecca nodded skeptically. He still continued. "Humans are a species who have committed horrible atrocities in face of us Gods, and they all are arrogant, ignorant, and reckless beings who can't control themselves. Humans are ugly, and she is a human, so _therefore_ I do not have this 'crush' on her." He did that dramatic head turn where he'd close his eyes and keep his face away from Rebecca's sight.

"Uh-huh." She nodded. "All those reasons are utter bullshit. You and I both share a similar view on my species, but the fact that you're using things that have nothing to do with Lexi just goes to show that you definitely feel something for her."

He groaned. But she was still talking. "I think this is something that I'm gonna take note of."

"Oh no." He looked at her. "No, no, no, no, _no!_ This has nothing to do with you!"

"Oh, so you do like her?"

"I-" He was getting really frustrated right now. "I don't!"

"Okay… well, fine." Rebecca looked down. "So you like how she looks?"

He paused. Zamasu didn't know that answering her question semi-honestly would lead him into a trap, so he did. "Umm… she's uhh…" How come he can't string up stupid words to speak? "She's… _exceptionally pretty_ , for a human woman."

"Ohhh, okay." She looked down and back at Zamasu. "So I'll tell her that you think she's pretty, then-"

"DON'T YOU DARE, SAY ANY _THING_ TO HER!" He literally was standing from his seat pointing at Rebecca.

Rebecca shrugged. "Why not? It's nice to compliment people."

"Just… don't tell her that. Keep that away from her." He slumped back down and propped his elbow against his knee with his face in his hand.

"Is it not true?"

"It is-" He shot up, retracting his statement. "WAIT, no it's not! It's not true, not true at all! She's just…" He groaned into his hand again. "Keep your mouth shut. You heard nothing from me."

Rebecca came over to place her hand on his shoulder. "Zamasu, it's perfectly normal to feel this way. C'mon, don't be upset at yourself, Lexi is a beautiful person."

"It's not normal." He wasn't even looking at her, his voice was muffled by his hand, conflicting thoughts clashing with one another in his head.

"Yes it is. The only downside is that you can't exactly get her."

The connotation that he was getting had nothing to do with Lexi's relationship status, but everything to do with Rebecca thinking that a _god_ was unable to entice another being to be with them. So he got offended, for the wrong reason. " _Excuse me?"_

"Huh?" Rebecca leaned back, seeing the look on his face.

"Are you trying to say that I am _incapable_ of getting who I want?" He blinked. Zamasu was a confident Kaioshin apprentice really, he knew that he had the ability to attract people. But this is the first time he's ever said something like that. It was strange to even hear it from his own mouth.

"No, no, I'm sure you can make any woman fall for you." She removed her hand from his shoulder. "But she's taken. She's Jay's girlfriend."

 _...Oh_ , he knew that already. But he didn't think that Rebecca meant that at all. "I know that. And that doesn't bother me," He became adamant again, standing up and walking to the stairs. "Because I don't like her."

Rebecca just nodded, still smirking at him as he went up the stairs. He glanced down at her accidentally, stopped in his tracks and scowled. "Stop smiling at me like that." And then he went up the stairs at a quicker pace.

 _He's adorable_ , Rebecca shook her head. The smirk on her face became a silly grin, because not only did she figure out that a human woman could indeed catch his eyes, but this same human woman was a very good friend of hers, someone who she calls almost every week on her free time. Now this was some _tea_ that she'd have to hold onto, and she'll purposely leave the two alone whenever she can just to see the Kaioshin's behavior. Walking into the kitchen with the empty plate that one had froyo cubes on it, she placed it in the sink silently amusing herself with such thoughts. She heard the sound of footsteps coming back downstairs and Zamasu entered the kitchen.

"Where are those chocolates?"

She laughed, and opened the fridge, which was where the box was in so that the chocolates wouldn't melt. Rebecca handed them over to him. He took it and fast walked out of the kitchen without a word, and she called out to him. "Make sure to _properly_ thank her tomorrow, Zamasu!"

A faint 'Keep your mouth shut' could be heard from the top of the stairs into her corridor, the vague sound of a door being closed was the final thing she heard. Ollie and Loki approached Rebecca and she knelt down to pet the both of them. "I know, he's just in denial, you guys." She smiled to herself, he'll have to be spending an entire day with the crew. And that includes Lexi being near him as well.

 _Tomorrow is gonna be a lonnnng day…_

ΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩ

He is so lucky that he had this large box of chocolates of which he was taking his sweet time to enjoy. All these assortments of chocolate emitted sounds of delight from the Kaioshin, and he forgotten about the internal crisis that he was going through. All of that was wiped out of his mind just by eating these chocolates that Lexi had bought him.

He cleared his throat, reminding himself again.

He was reclined nonchalantly on his bed with the chocolatier box on his lap, sitting back and lounging like one of those Greek gods eating grapes on a bed wearing a loose tunic. Except he was eating chocolates, gifted to him by a beautiful woman who isn't really beautiful and he keeps forgetting to _forget_ about how pretty this damn woman was!

This isn't fair. Why did he get put into this situation, with these people? Did Gowasu predict that his pupil would go through all of this? If he did, then that would be a dirty move on his part. But if he didn't then what the heck was he supposed to tell Gowasu when he returns? He'll ask 'How was the experience', and all Zamasu could possibly say is;

' _I hate this one woman, her friends are annoying but the doctor one is okay, I became friends with two dogs, got stared at like gourmet dinner at a public place, and there was this one pretty woman who I can't stop staring at for some odd reason but I swear I don't like her at all.'_

Almost everything in that statement is a lie.

Although here he was, eating chocolates and gathering chariots mentally for the sake of his own sanity. He purposely ignored everything for real this time, and focused on his time earlier in the day. Speaking of which, Rebecca has been feeling much better ever since he sat with her over the night. She's been talking more and smiling a lot more often…

Only not to him.

It's weird because _he's_ the one who aided her, in a sense, with her difficulty sleeping. He _allowed_ her to _sleep on him_ for Kami's sake, just to get rid of her hollow vibes, and all he got back was a small conversation when she finally came downstairs. It wasn't even a conversation, it was nothing more than small talk.

That was it. That was all he got out of her in the morning. Not that he was expecting her to greet him with giant hugs and… actually, that _was_ what he expected her to do. It just looked the most probable, because the woman has been really touchy with him ever since he set foot into her house and now that he's kind of reciprocated, if that's even the right word for it, the same actions, it seems like she's become standoffish in a sense. And it was very subtle too, usually she'd be more energetic and direct with him doing something stupid like taunting him with wits or tapping his nose. But today, there was none of that.

The only thing that slightly mitigated this behavior was Lexi visiting, that was when he noticed that Rebecca was… loosening up? She stopped being quiet and strangely off put the second her female friend entered her house, speaking with both him and her in her usual friendly manner. It would be really suspect if Rebecca called Lexi to visit her first and decided to use her as a social scapegoat in a sense, but after Lexi left Rebecca went back to speaking with him like she normally would.

So, what was that all about? He was starting to learn more about her behavior and what went on in her excellently self-controlled mind. He was beginning to see another side to this woman that arises from finally exacting what she always looked like she yearned for; contact. Close, intimate platonic contact, and seeing how she felt the night before with him, compared to how stoic she was in the morning as well as her sudden change in attitude when Lexi showed up was giving him more clues on Rebecca's psyche.

And, through a minute dose of insight, he was starting to uncover the pieces to the puzzle, and slowly started to see why Rebecca wasn't receiving what she wanted more often.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **ALRIGHT, looks like Zamasu's gonna be spending more time with other humans, once again! I know you all are probably sighing out of this, bu trust me you can pull through this experience with him. We all know that he can.**

 **I dunno if you guys could have caught the drift when Rebecca slept on him; he is highly intuitive and sensitive to a beings' emotions, and when someone else is upset, he would ask in order to figure out the problem and put an end to the frustrating feeling. That's if the emotions that a person is feeling are so strong that he can see it on their face and hear it from their mouths. Everything he had done was purely logical; he wanted to know what her problem is and how to get rid of it, and fortunately for Rebecca she didn't have to say much because of this.**

 **But what's low-key…** _ **high-key**_ **illogical is the amount of denial the man will go through to prove something not true. Once again, he saw Lexi as physically attractive and nothing more, until this particular day where he actually got to know a bit more about her. To find out that some really hot, nice woman not only is very fit and athletic, but knows martial arts is like a goldmine for a man who is knowledgeable in martial arts. And fortunately but** _ **unfortunately**_ **for Zamasu, he happened to be one of those males. Rebecca nipped his feelings in the bud, and everything for him has gotten worse (in his eyes). Well, on the bright side, he's gonna be in Lexi's presence for the next chapter which is great. And he also got a beautiful big box of chocolates from a beautiful woman, which is** _ **just great**_ **…**

 **There will be a lot of war going on in his head by the time the next day is over. Cue the Vietnam flashback meme.**

 **There is gonna be a longer time interval between this chapter and the next. The last portion of this chapter was supposed to be in the next but then I was like** _ **nahh.**_ **I might not post all month in August, either that or a new chapter will be uploaded in mid-to-late August. And for that one review that was asking if this story was gonna be long…**

 _ **I have no promises on that, fam.**_


	19. Synchronicities

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I am not back from vacation right now, however I was intuitively compelled to put this chapter out because something good and relieving took place today. As for the time when punctual uploads would happen, I think it would be right before school when I get back on track with the story. Besides, this chapter and the next are gonna be** _ **hella long**_ **, you're gonna have a hell lot to read. Take this update as me just lurking long enough to post this one here, and then after that I'm out again lol. Vacation is lit, like always, but the hiatus isn't over just yet.**

 **Quick time stamp; this is the fifth day in on Zamasu's one-month stay, the first day of the fourth month. So he's been on Earth for four full months as of now.** _ **Geez**_ **, maybe I should put a warning after this sentence...**

 **Sit the fuck tight because the next three chapters are going to be the most** _ **retardedly enlightening**_ **chapters ever consciously written on a word document. Do not come for me, I already warned you about this, both here… and nineteen chapters ago.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Synchronicities**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Later on, nearing dusk time, Zamasu had opened the door to reveal some Asian near-middle aged man in a casual blue dress shirt. Since Rebecca was busy upstairs, she called him and told him the open her door for her, and the man did a double take and a triple blink at the being in front of him.

"Umm… good evening to you, uhh…"

Zamasu raised a brow, but still decided to give this man his name. "Zamasu."

"Zamasu, right." The guy snapped his fingers with a smile in learning his name. "I'm here to see Rebecca. We have important things to discuss."

Zamasu allowed the male in, stepping aside and closing the door when he was fully in the living room. The Kaioshin watched him take a seat on her sofa, which the way he did so indicated that he's been here more than once. Not that he was being clumsy with his movements, but the man looked comfortable enough to sit and wait.

"Who is it?" He heard Rebecca yell from the hallway, he could pinpoint that, but she didn't come down the stairs.

"It's some… human male…" Zamasu didn't know his name, and the guy did the same thing Zamasu did.

"It's Terry." Terry was speaking to both him and Rebecca. He could hear her saying 'Oh… I'll be right down' before he heard a door shut. Terry looked down at the carpet and back at the Kaioshin. "So… are you a friend of hers?"

This was actually a first. He was surprised this man didn't say anything that would make Zamasu look weird, he just asked if he and Rebecca were mere friends. "I wouldn't say that. I'm just visiting."

Maybe it would have been _easier_ to just say yes but Zamasu can't lie about stuff like that. Terry raised a brow but still nodded. "Okay. How long have you been here?"

The Kaioshin instantly figured out that something must have happened, something that he should be aware about. It was indicative in the way Terry inquired to him. "Five days."

"Ah, so less than a week. Umm…" Terry nodded and looked downwards. The Kaioshin can see that Terry was debating on saying more than that, but reluctance kept seeping in because the gynecologist didn't think Zamasu was close with her at all. And also because he didn't want the Kaioshin to get involved with something he didn't need to be in.

But Zamasu was curious nonetheless. "Did something happen?"

Terry looked up and slowly nodded his head, a little skeptical of how Zamasu quickly caught his drift. "Yes, I came here to speak to her about it of course. I didn't really formally introduce myself, I apologize." Terry held his hand to his chest. "My name is Terry, I am a gynecologist and I work in the same hospital that Rebecca works at."

Zamasu nodded, and then frowned. "What's a… gynecologist?" He said the word slowly, feeling the way it rolled out of his tongue.

"A gynecologist is basically a doctor who treats diseases and medical conditions that affect female reproductive organs, and women in general." Terry explained simply, and Zamasu nodded again.

Because of this newfound information, and because he didn't know how hospital's worked, and also because he doesn't know that Rebecca's been poisoned, he thought Terry was here for the sake of her health. "Is Rebecca sick?"

"Oh no, not at all. I'm not her gynecologist." Terry nervously chuckled. Yeah, sure he was a man who's seen and studied in the realms of female reproduction but the idea of being a female friend's gynecologist still seemed weird. It doesn't matter how long he's known Rebecca, and it's not because he isn't mature enough to handle such proceedings. "It's for something else involving her work. Nothing important."

No, it _was_ something important, but Terry had made it up in his mind to not tell Zamasu. Otherwise, why would this man drive to Rebecca's house for something that wasn't significant? It raised more questions than it should, due to Zamasu's intuition, but he decided that it was best not to press Terry into telling him this information.

Since it is, in all rights, none of his business.

It's been two minutes since the silence had settled in the living room. The Kaioshin could sense that whatever Terry had to say was urgent because his leg was bouncing, he was exhibiting a nervous tic. He also looked like this information had been sitting in the back burner for a while. The Kaioshin frowned, opening his mouth to finally ask what the real deal was but right before he was going to speak, Rebecca came downstairs quickly.

Her hair was in a messy low ponytail and she had a white shirt on with blue pants. "Terry! I'm so sorry I spent so much time upstairs, I was fixing up something. My old book collection needed to be dusted, I haven't touched it in a long time." Bookshelf? She had a whole bookshelf and she didn't tell him? That's what she's been doing all this time? Zamasu looked at her and she gave him a look back. "What?"

He tilted his head. "You had a bookshelf hiding somewhere?"

"Well… I sort of forgotten about it." She raised her shoulders with a smile. "Sorry, dude."

Zamasu just shook his head at her, and Terry looked between the two and then at Rebecca. "How could you forget about it if you called me four days ago, and told me the book you borrowed from me was lost in your collection?"

"Umm…" she giggled, and this time earned looks from both males in the room. "Okay, okay look… I forgot about that too."

Terry narrowed his eyes with a smile. "Yeah, _right."_

Zamasu crossed his arms. " _Right, indeed_."

"You two are so objective." She sat down, purposely ignoring the suspicious glares of the other men. "Besides, my book collection is all fixed up so Zamasu, you can go upstairs and enjoy it all you want, it's in my room. I gotta talk to Terry."

Her timbre held the same connotation as an annoyed person telling an annoying fly to 'shoo' and go away. Even Terry caught this, but because Zamasu told him that he wasn't close with Rebecca the gynecologist sort of shrugged it off, although he was a little surprised at how much the woman _didn't_ want Zamasu to hear of their conversation. The Kaioshin blinked, he'll definitely get back at her for her blatant insolence, but now he decided to keep whatever they would talk about out of his earshot. It's none of his business.

"Fair enough." He turned and went right upstairs to where her room was, allowing the two individuals to speak to one another. When Rebecca no longer heard the sound of footsteps in her earshot, she sighed heavily.

Terry frowned at her. "I know that he's just a visitor and all, but you really didn't have to tell him to leave like _that_."

"I don't want him to be a part of any of my business." The red haired woman flat out spoke with no falter in her voice.

"Uhh… Okay." Terry blinked at her tone. "Has he... angered you in some way?"

"No, why?"

"You seem so adamant." This was not a good look on Rebecca's part because with the interaction Terry saw, it seemed like she was pushing him away. What they were to speak about was a little confidential, but Rebecca made it sound like this guy resembled the annoying Orange or something.

"It's best to keep him out of that whole thing, seriously." She waved her hand. "So, this is about the black box thing…"

"Yes, Mark gave me some more details on behalf of what they found." Terry pulled out a small notepad. He took notes of the important things when Mark had called his phone earlier. "They have sent several investigators to each and every one of the places this box could've been a day ago. They have narrowed it down to 3 primary locations, and the box itself was cracked open revealing the messages, and they did a fingerprint scan to see where this could have possibly came from."

"They did?" Rebecca was sort of relieved to hear that this incident wasn't as hard to solve as it appeared to be, but she wasn't completely alleviated. "The fingerprints… what did they find?"

"Well, at first, Mark found out that one of the papers, the one with the address and time, came from a random old woman in her eighties." Terry looked down. "The other one came from across the country, we don't know the exact person because the only fingerprints that they found obviously, was yours, since you touched it. Prior to that, there was nothing else."

"...How the fuck?" She shook her head. "You mean to tell me that they _still_ haven't found an exact culprit? I don't think the woman had anything to do with this at all but…" Rebecca scratched the back of her head, with a deep frown.

"Get this though; the one with the address didn't have traces of galena laced into it. The other one did however, and the powder that they used was so fine that it could have been turned to gas had there been some temperature change. Not even that, but the fingerprint scanner turned up those two completely different locations from the primary ones. So it's as if they took a piece of paper from an old woman and put it along with their own to 'confuse' us. Ugh..." Terry shook his head. "Obviously they used some form of masking. They covered their tracks pretty well."

Rebecca blinked. "Covered their tracks _my ass_." She pointed to her TV while speaking to him. "Have you seen the news? They're getting spotted and caught left and fucking right. It seems like they have like… two different spectrums, these black van criminals."

"Like one portion is reckless and making all the noise while the other is quietly doing the _real_ dirty work?"

Rebecca raised her finger to her lips. "You know, you actually put that in better words than I did." That statement earned her a toothy grin from the Asian gynecologist and she laughed. "I know that they are investigating the sites now, is that all that they have found?"

Terry sighed. "Yep, unfortunately. Although to be quite frank, I didn't think we'd find _that_ much information from a tiny box." He crossed his arms and leaned back. "Just goes to show that these criminals are probably not what we think they are."

"They're not _aimless_." Rebecca stressed the last word, and Terry looked at her. "But they aren't that careful either. Who knows, really?" Her last laugh was so uncomfortable and worrisome. The doctor shrugged and looked down at her lap.

He placed a hand on her shoulder."Rebecca, I can assure you that no one will harm you."

"We went through that already. Although this time I'm sure nobody is eavesdropping." She snorted. "Not even Zamasu. He's too busy reading up there, that his favorite thing to do."

Terry raised his brows. "He likes to read?"

"Yup. Although I kinda introduced him to movies and he started watching a bunch of movies afterwards." A smile overcame her features. "That same day I told you about the box, he had spent all night doing nothing but watching movies. He's not human, and he doesn't need sleep."

"Well, I _figured_ that." Terry leaned forward to rest his elbows against his knees. "Is he more than a visitor, because that's what he told me he was."

"Hn?" Rebecca furrowed her brows. What Zamasu said was not false, but at the same time she got to know a bit more about the Kaioshin, just about enough for him to be considered a little more than some visitor. "He's actually supposed to be with my best friend, but she's traveling around the world for exhibitions."

"Irene?" Terry knew her best friend's name, mainly because he bought one of her pieces some time ago.

"Yup. So he's staying with me for a month. He's a cool guy, just kinda hard to talk to if he thinks you're stupid."

Terry shrugged. "That's kind of expected, since he's an extraterrestrial. I always thought aliens would like to see the 'best of the best' out of us, or something."

Rebecca made a sound. "Well, _actually_ he is an alien but he's a different kind of alien, umm. It's a long story, sort of." She made a so-so gesture and Terry tilted his head. "I dunno how to explain it, to be honest."

"I think you can truncate it easily." He smiled, and Rebecca paused and then nodded.

She said her next statement in the most serious no-bullshit tone ever mustered. "He's a God Of Creation in training."

It took longer than two second for Terry to process that sentence, and even longer for him to decide on whether or not that was _true_. "A… a God of Creation?"

"...yeah…" She played with the button on her pants as Terry's 'what the hell' face kept escalating. "You said you wanted me to truncate it so… there ya go."

"Wait," the gynecologist held his hands up, "He told you this, or did you know this beforehand?"

"He told me. And he showed me, he's got all these powers and can create anything he wants right in front of your eyes. I would call him down but," she looked up at the stairs. "I imagine he doesn't wanna be bothered, especially with all those books he's found in my literary arsenal…"

Meanwhile, in all the time that was supposed to be used reading the books off of Rebecca's collection, Zamasu midway turned into Curious George and started looking at random stuff on her desk and accidentally went through the top portions of her cabinet, in pure curiosity. This wasn't like him at all, he's usually very rigid and would slap himself for touching someone else's belongings but nowadays he's been far too curious to reprimand himself every five seconds.

There were these giant suction cup looking things that were wirelessly connected to this glowing-rectangle hologram thing, at least put in Zamasu's words. What he was actually referring to when he saw it was a music player and wireless bluetooth headphones, he picked it up and examined the headphones like a scientist would a chemical. The headphones were white and the 'cushions' were azure blue, as well as the accents. One each earmuff was a logo of a head with glasses having headphones on, yet Zamasu was wondering what this thing was and how to use it. He tapped the music player's screen and was surprised to see that it opened without the need of a password; he was greeted with names of different songs that he obviously didn't know about. The Kaioshin scrolled through the _exceptionally long_ list of music, stopping for a second to actually sit down on her office chair to continue on. He decided that scrolling wasn't gonna help his curiosity so he just tapped on one of the songs this thing had to offer.

The first thing he was introduced to was the color changing cube that floated above the player, pulsing to the complex, uppity beat that sounded a lot like that one song that was playing in Irene's car. He slowly started nodding to the music, soon finding a liking to how it seemed to change in rhythm and tempo. This particular song had deep tones that contrasted nicely with the lighter synths, it was something Zamasu never heard before.

He was almost disappointed that that first song was only five minutes and two seconds long.

Zamasu looked at the title of the first song, noticing that it was made by a person named ONYX. He thought it was a weird name, but the name itself would end up being stuck in his mind for some time. There was another song by this same person and this one wasn't as punchy and uppity as the other. Instead, it was a more swingy beat at first, which then cleanly transitioned to some impactful kick-snare-kick-snare thing. The Kaioshin was listening to dubstep from the same particular music producer and despite the weirdness of the whole situation, this song didn't fail to intrigue him. It was shorter than the other, only being two and half minutes long, but there was always a replay button…

That Zamasu did not find until he noticed there was a circling arrow going in on itself and thought that it was some other weird feature and was both shocked, and pleased to hear the same song play again.

He ended up doing this for the past fifteen minutes, just listening to random song and bopping his head to a hecka lot of the beats, especially by this ONYX person. He also took into account how _good_ the song sounded as it was passing through his ears from these headphones, it made the experience all the more enjoyable. Casually, he'd listen to a song and whenever it would finish, another song would play. He was okay with this particular way the player would function, as it was on shuffle mode (not on his own accord, you really think he knows what _shuffling a playlist_ means?) until one particular song came, and he heard this voice. The song itself had electro swing vibes and then this suave, smooth male voice said 'Welcome to St. James Ballroom.' Then this voice laughed warmly, followed by a jubilant 'Woo!' and the beat really kicked in.

And then that same male voice started singing and Zamasu blinked like multiple times, suddenly drawn to this particular voice. It wasn't powerful or strong, but it had a playful coy tone to it along with a charming, velvety ring that went so darn well with the snazzy beat. Zamasu leaned forward, _who is this person?_ Who is this male human with a voice that sounds like beautiful hymns? He looked at the name, kind of confused because there was two. One was a band name, and the other was _Zachary Tenae_ , so Zamasu assumed that the latter was the actual singer. He may be wrong, but he needed to find another song with this particular name.

It didn't take long for him to see another song with the same name. He tapped it and this song had a low and chill bassline with the male voice singing again. This time, inside of Zamasu nodding to the best, he was leaning back against the office chair with eyes closed and hands resting behind his head. The lyrics went by his head, particular portions of the lines sticking in the Kaioshin's head.

 _If we were made in His image_

 _Then call us by our names_

 _Most intellects do not Believe in God_

 _But they fear us just the same_

There was a frown on his face hearing those lines. What the heck did that mean?

 _The man that knows something_

 _Knows that he knows nothing at all_

 _Does it seem colder in your summer time_

 _And hotter in your fall?_

The words stuck to his head like a really strong adhesive. Until he caught whiff of the fourth verse;

 _You rush into destruction_

 _'Cuz you don't have nothing left_

 _The mothership can't save you_

 _So your ass is gon' get left_

...Is this man talking about humans? Then why does he say 'us', when referring to Gods? As far as he knew, there were no Gods alive that sounded like this man, nor did they sing, so this is a mere human equating himself and his species with Gods isn't it? Zamasu went back, he replayed the song and listened closely to the lyrics that this human being with a beautiful soothing voice was saying. He sat there trying to uncover the meaning of this song because it was intriguing him. How someone can make such a good song _and_ have lyrics that held such meaning, so much so that a Kaioshin was sitting there deciphering their songs.

Oh, this wasn't the only song he did that with. Rebecca had a myriad of songs in different genres, quite a number of her songs were made by or included Zachary and these songs ranged in different genres themselves. It just so happened that this Zachary person had both a technical and a very versatile voice. Some songs almost sounded like it wasn't him singing but it actually was, and Zamasu could have sworn that any instrument in lieu was singing with him. It sounded pleasing, aesthetic, he didn't think that such a thing would exist on Earth.

That adds to Zamasu's ever-growing list of things he became fond of; food, movies, pudgy adorable pugs and giant bear-dogs, and now music.

He low-key realized that he shouldn't be spending so much time listening to music even before he decided to tamper with the player and stare at the pulsing color-changing cube. But of course, he ended up sitting there bopping his head, decoding song lyrics, and finding admiration for a man's voice for a good hour. At some point, there was another song that was playing and this one of course had Zachary in it. Zamasu was pleasantly listening to this voice thinking it would continue on to be the same soothing, sultry voice that he always had, and then there was a part in the song where this man _belted_ , hitting a high note so perfectly that Zamasu literally had to take off the headphones and set them down.

He looked down at the device and paused the song because _golly,_ that was far too beautiful for him to even comprehend. Sweet Kami, Zamasu couldn't imagine meeting this man in person… How does one have a voice like that just resting in them on a _daily basis_?

He heard the door open downstairs and assumed that it was Terry leaving, and it finally closed after a pause. Zamasu realized what he had been doing this whole time which was _not_ reading any books, and instead listening to random songs that he found a liking to. Was this okay? Sure, he involuntarily made it a point to hide whatever he seemed to like, that's something that arose from being around Irene too much, but now a small part of him was questioning that same motive. What good or bad would it do for him if she finds him sitting in her office chair? It's not like she could castigate him for being in her room, on her office chair, not even realizing the aged opened book that had a pen attached to it, containing long diaries of the doctor that could explain why she's so _bizarre_.

He didn't even know what a diary _should_ look like, for crying out silently.

Zamasu had passed up the opened book, dismissing it for her work as a doctor. He went towards a folder in the tiny 1-foot high shelf on her desk and opened it to see a bunch of photos. He took one out to see a picture of Rebecca as a baby; she had bigger green eyes and a giant pudgy smile on her face. Her red hair was short and in pigtails and she was wearing an apple onesie. If Zamasu liked humans, he would have thought she looked just as adorable as Ollie does on a daily basis, but one thing he noticed about this picture is how _big_ her smile was, even as an infant. He went through a few others and these pictures weren't chronological; he'd find a picture with her sitting in her parents' mansion with a giant smile and as a child he noticed that Rebecca was always wearing some form of simple crystal jewelry in her older pictures. Whether it be bracelets, necklaces or earrings, Rebecca seemed to look like she was attracted to natural crystals, even through the pictures Zamasu could see that these crystals had a calming effect about them.

Another thing he noticed was that she was almost always wearing an oversized white shirt whenever a picture was snapped of her doing something. At one point, there was a picture where she was dressed as a doctor, smiling at the camera with no front teeth. And then there was another where she was sitting with Irene playing with a bunch of toys on a picnic blanket. Zamasu frowned; Irene had the same puffy coily natural hair that she has now, it was in a giant bun on her head and she was a bit more chubbier back then. She and Rebecca had smiles on their face that were warm and happy, though Zamasu can't imagine seeing that same radiant smile on Rebecca's face now.

Obviously, there was a very pronounced difference between Rebecca in her tween years and her in her actual teens. He noticed that she stopped wearing crystals and she stopped wearing oversized white sweaters and instead started wearing clothes that looked really expensive. She also was always with a large group of people in her teen photos with drinks and cars or whatnot, and he noticed that same smile take a really weird, _fake_ turn when she was in these events. Rebecca's childhood pictures were with her in different places doing different things, but her teen pictures were literally nothing but parties or large get-togethers. There was only a couple pictures with her and Irene, but in every single one of her party pictures Zamasu could see that the smile she had looked… dirty? He didn't know how to describe it but from those smiles alone, he could see that in this era of her life Rebecca looked like someone who manipulated others, someone who can ruin the social livelihood of her own peers if she wanted to and it looked like she _definitely_ did back then.

He noticed there were several pictures where she was with Adrian, one of which was a picture of them kissing in front of a lake. One thing he had to say was that Adrian looked a lot different as a teenager, maybe it's because his hair was box-braided and he had more baby fat instead of a well-chiseled jawline, or maybe it's because Zamasu could see that the man was a much nicer looking person than now. Okay, that doesn't mean that Adrian looks like a _mean_ person now; in these pictures he had a face that screamed _benign,_ someone who just looked like an incredibly kind and nice person. Also someone who was cordial with people in general, now he still is, although the man had placed barriers in a way. When Zamasu looked at younger Adrian, and looked at the smiles and the faces of younger Rebecca, he sensed a huge amount of suspicion from comparing the two.

Perhaps Rebecca caught Adrian's eyes, or actually it was _the other way around_ and they started dating. He had noticed that Adrian didn't speak much with Rebecca so she must have done something to him that either was unforgivable, or still affects him to this day. All these pictures are of them hugging and making stupid faces or kissing and to anyone regular person it would look cute and romantic, but Zamasu saw it as a _disaster_ waiting to happen because of the very different dynamic of the two.

He needed to ask her about her past- wait no, that wouldn't do anything. Rebecca would probably shrug it off and wouldn't explain anything to him because she's just that secretive, he already could see that. The only person he could possibly ask is Adrian and he could see some form of dialogue taking place because the music producer seemed like a reasonable person. The only thing that didn't seem reasonable was why he acted that way, and what the heck happened to Rebecca that made her change in the way she did. He wasn't concerned, Zamasu was just curious.

The next batch of photos were of her in medical school. She was in a white lab coat actually doing what she looked like she wanted to do as a child, which contrasted greatly with the person that he saw in her teens. They almost seem like two different people, she looked like she was in a place she wanted to be. He sifted through them and randomly came across a photo of her in her senior year of highschool, hidden away within the many medical photos he looked through. In this particular photo she looked very pretty indeed but… she looked sunken. Once again, this was hard to put into exact words; Rebecca was wearing makeup and she was taking a photo of herself with a large mirror behind her. It's very subtle, because on the surface she just looks really beautiful under the lighting, but her eyes looked so drained and conflicted. Even the smile on her face reminded him of a refurbished appliance; something that still functions but can never be the same as it used to be. Her smile was cracked and crooked, her teeth were and always have been perfectly fine though, and she looked like she lost some weight as well.

Zamasu shook his head and hastily placed the picture deep into the folder before putting the photos in his hand back in as well, just seeing that picture had him mid-key _shook_ and completely wiped his curiosity away. _What even happened to this woman?_ Perhaps knowing what took place back then could lead him to figuring out her problems now, because it seems like her lingering sadness was something long-term, something that happened years ago.

He heard footsteps coming upstairs, and instinctively placed the folder back where he had found it. Zamasu grabbed a random book from her collection and sat on her amazingly comfortable bed, slowly making himself lay down because _gee_ this bed is soft. Rebecca opened her door and looked over to see the Kaioshin laying on her bed.

"Hey."

She had a smile on her face, the same one that she always has when she's about to annoy him. He looked down at her and just blinked, then back at his book with a neutral look on his face _for a reason_. "Hello." Zamasu spoke quietly.

"Terry left some time ago, by the way. It's really late right now, and I don't even know how but I'm feeling tired." She sighed and sat on the foot of her bed in front of Zamasu. "I haven't even done anything today, other than speak with Lexi and Terry and… that's pretty much it."

Okay no, he wasn't going to have this slide by. Now she was speaking normally with him, completely different from how she was earlier today and right before he went upstairs. And speaking of which… "I would have lifted you and thrown you across your room, but this book is very entertaining and I don't feel like expelling any energy at the moment."

He said that because he was still pissed off at her attitude earlier, but after he had spoken Zamasu had realized how harshly _shady_ that sounded. Not only did he not make any eye contact while she spoke, but he had just heavily implied that he didn't give a shit about what she was saying, and also made it clear that words on a paper were more important to his eyes than her own face.

And he hadn't even spent a full hour with Jay yet. Somehow, he ended up matching the same amount of shadiness as the producer himself.

Rebecca frowned, shocked at his blatancy. "Huh?"

He was thinking of repeating himself, but he decided against that. She knew what he said. "I _know_ you are well aware of your actions." He flipped the page. "You've been having an attitude around me for no reason whatsoever, and I don't like it at all." He closed his book and finally looked at her. "So, what is your problem?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't need to repeat myself, you know what I mean."

She went back into her memory banks. Sure, according to Terry, she actually did speak to him a little rudely back when he was downstairs and yes, she had practically been ignoring him all morning. But, as one-sided as it sounded, Rebecca could not see why it was bothering him if he didn't want to _expel any energy._

"There is no problem." She shrugged. "I just had very confidential things to discuss with Terry. That's it."

"And you felt the need to speak to me in such an impudent manner?" Zamasu could already sense that she was going to say that 'since he's a God he shouldn't care', but that's not the case. "You should know better. To talk to a _God_ with such a tone is both disrespectful and disgusting. The last thing you ought to do is shoo me away."

The doctor looked really confused, scared, and also annoyed at the same time. The scared factor was minute, but her irritation was growing rapidly. "I just told you to leave. I don't see why you're getting upset, that happened hours ago." Her biting attitude had arisen once again, taking it's rightful place again after being squashed down for a while.

However, to Zamasu this side of her was new since he'd never thought that she would say something like that. But there was _nothing new_ about it at all. So he placed the book down gently against her bed and sat up, keeping himself on check for a few seconds because her voice was starting to make his eye twitch. " _Really_?"

" _Yes."_ Her brows were furrowed. "If you wanted to call me out on keeping you out of something that's _none of your business_ , you could have done that in _due time_. But you didn't, so-"

" _Excuse me?"_ Zamasu's one nettled voice became fully irate and he slowly rose up from where he was sitting, towering over the smaller woman with a deep look of anger on his face. Rebecca just sat there quietly, at first she leaned back with fear laced eyes, and she noticeably tried to quelch that same fear but was failing miserably. He expected her to continue on since she was so brazenly confident in spewing out whatever she can, but she looked like she would start stammering. "Speak."

The firm order register instantly and she sat straight up, moving back from the Kaioshin even though he wasn't making any advances on her. The apprentice had far more influence on her emotions due to his birth-given stature; while he could calm her down, he could also make her fearful beyond belief. "U-umm… I-I didn't mean to…" Rebecca couldn't fully get her words out because she was _that_ frightened.

He took the deepest breath possible, if this woman was supposed to take him out tomorrow with her friends, the best thing to do was not get so needlessly angry right now. She simply thought she could bad mouth him and didn't have enough to that fake bravado to back up her rebuttals, and because of that, he found no reason to physically hurt her nor yell at her for acting so rude. Such a thing would be a waste of energy on his part and overall, a waste of time.

So he bent down to pick up the book from her bed, noting how she flinched despite his hands being nowhere near her. Zamasu looked back at her with pissed off and fiery eyes and she started to whimper.

" _Know your place._ " And with that, he turned around, purposely leaving her foolishly sitting on her bed and exited out her room swiftly. He went into his own room and was reminded of the fact that he didn't finish his chocolatier box, so he decided to spend the rest of the night reading and eating because that's what Gods do.

±‡±‡±‡±‡±‡±‡±‡±‡±‡±

The next morning wasn't any weird; Zamasu had taken a break from reading in the middle of the night and he was still reading by the time the morning hit. He looked at his door, seeing a malamute's black nose peek out through its opening. Loki then slowly pedaled into the room, approaching the Kaioshin's bed and jumping on it to lay right beside him with his head against Zamasu's thigh. Zamasu looked down at Loki for a moment, and then went back to reading his book. They stayed like that for a minute, until Loki started moving his head in front of Zamasu's book as if he was trying it as well. When the Kaioshin looked down at Loki, the malamute would rest his head back on his thigh. This went on at least six times, Loki getting Zamasu's way of reading the book, and then retracting when Zamasu was looking directly at him.

"Well, good morning to you too." He chuckled and rubbed the back of Loki's ear, his favorite place to be caressed, watching Loki's eyes close as he became comfortable. The malamute then looked up at Zamasu and whined. The Kaioshin frowned. "What's wrong?" Loki whined again, and then he sat up. They were now eye-to-eye, and Zamasu could see that the malamute was worried about his owner. "She's fine, Loki."

She could have been killed yesterday, but she was fine nonetheless.

Next, Ollie came in, he wasn't as jubilant as he usually is. The pug went to Zamasu's other side so now the Kaioshin had a dog on both sides of his bed. Ollie started whining too and Zamasu repeated what he said to Loki. He continued reading with the company of the two dogs who were slowly becoming less anxious about Rebecca, and after thirty minutes started hearing the sound of a shower being on for some time, and then it finally turned off. Then, after several minutes or so, he heard footsteps in the hallway. As they got closer to his room, they were lighter and much slower, with two light knocks against his door.

He didn't say anything, but Rebecca slowly opened his door looking down at the floor. Her hair was let down and she was wearing an oversized sweater with leggings. "...Good morning…"

He was reading, but he still responded to her bluntly. "Good morning."

She started rubbing her covered knuckles as she walked up to him. Rebecca had reflected on what she did and how she acted, she realized that he was right; now, she just felt horrible and wanted to somehow make it up to him. The only thing she could do at the moment was apologize. Rebecca looked down at him with soft eyes. "Zamasu…"

She saw his brow raise, and then he looked up at her. His authoritative look reminded her of the small amount of men in her life who were there to keep her in check and who looked after any of the actions she made. Right off the bat, the only people she could name were her father, Adrian, and France although that one was obviously because he was her boss, and now Zamasu. That male dominative vibe was rare in her life right now, the only person who could check her was herself. He didn't say anything, but made it clear that he was listening to her.

Looking down and then back up at him, she made eye contact with the god in his bed. "...I'm sorry."

Zamasu looked down in thought, she looked very sincere. Although she was timid in her apology he could see that, and he knew it was best to keep from getting upset. He also knew that harshly reprimanding her wouldn't help either, especially since she's truly sorry about the way she acted, and she was. He looked down at his book, which was nearing its end, and inhaled, his voice not being soft at all. "Just _know_ who you're talking to."

Rebecca nodded slowly, and then she looked down at her dogs who watched the interaction like watching a parent reprimand a child. "Hey, guys." She smiled and petted her dogs accordingly, asking them if they wanted breakfast. Her dogs ran downstairs, more than eager to eat while Zamasu stayed on his bed reading the last portions of this book. Rebecca stood right by the door looking at him for a moment, and then she silently closed his door.

Half an hour had passed, and Zamasu had finished his book. He closed it and placed it on his nightstand, feeling the fabric of his purple gi against his chest. He heard the sound of little paws making contact with his door, along with Ollie's barking. Zasmsu got up and opened the door and Ollie looked up at him ecstatically.

"What is it?" The Kaioshin's inquiry made the pug tug against his pants, trying to pull Zamasu out of his room. He raised his hands as if Ollie were some person pulling at his arm, eagerly wanting him to follow. "Okay, okay, I'll follow you." Zamasu walked down the stairs, seeing Ollie get there much faster than he did. Looki came around and looked up at the Kaioshin and barked. For some reason the both of them were very happy, of which Zamasu assumed it was because they ate.

The Kaioshin could smell _quite a variety_ of tasty aromas coming from the kitchen and obviously he was drawn to whatever the heck was being made in there. He didn't see any of her stoves on, which meant she had finished cooking, and there was no sign of her in the living room. The Kaioshin walked in away and didn't see any food in her kitchen..

"Hey."

Rebecca came out of the dining room connected to her kitchen, running a napkin along the side of her hand and leaning agains. Zamasu blinked, he expected to see food down here. "Hello… umm."

"Come." She walked back into the dining room, motioning for him to follow suit. Zamasu frowned, but still went along with whatever she wanted to show him. He had entered her dining room, the walls were textured and beige with frames and decorations hanging, in the middle of the room was a bunch of red and white seats couple with a large white table… that had a long laced table set with dishes, all of which had various, delicious breakfast foods; quiche, casserole, pancakes, waffles, eggs and granola bars all decked out in fancy, decorated ceramic plates. One of the white chairs were reserved with an empty plate, clean silverware along with a mug of coffee and a folded grape vine napkin. He looked at the table with wide eyes; there was a _lot_ of food in front of him in elegant plates.

She shyly walked up to him and pointed at the table. "That's… that's for you." Rebecca rubbed her arm with a tiny smile.

He looked at the table, and then back at her. "That?"  
"Yeah."

" _All_ of that?"

"Uh-huh."

"For me?"

"Mm-hmm."

He blinked down at the woman who looked back up at him. He quickly remembered what took place half an hour ago, and also last night, and narrowed his eyes with a smirk that he was initially trying to hide. "You think food is going to entice me into forgiving you completely?" He crossed his arms but still went over to still at the dinner table.

"Not really." Rebecca walked over to stand right behind his seat. "I just felt like making you stuff."

" _Right_." He nodded, taking the pie server and went into the hash browns first. He placed it down on his plate and then took a hefty bite out of it closing his eyes. The Kaioshin chewed, swallowed and then smirked down at the plate, taking more food out of the different dishes.

Rebecca was standing behind him, watching the way he was eating. She reluctantly kept quiet for a few minutes, and then she tapped his shoulder. He looked back at her and she sheepishly smiled. "...Do you forgive me?"

He blinked at her, looked down at the food and then looked to the side pondering. A pause, and then Zamasu turned in his seat to face her. "You're forgiven."

A really bright smile overcame her features and he blinked when she casted her face downwards. Her smile was pretty, but Rebecca was looking away from him as if she subconsciously didn't want him to see it. It's kind of the same behavior as someone who was repeatedly told that their smile was ugly covering their mouth when they laugh. She was thinking about something, and then she looked back at him. "Do you like it?"

This is the first time he's ever admitted that someone's cooking tasted good. "Yes." Zamasu went back to eating silently, and Rebecca looked at the ground. He could feel her debating on behalf of something though he didn't want to pry into her thoughts at the moment. She went over to sit across from him, folding her hands together as she smiled patiently. The Kaioshin noticed that she was waiting for him, and he addressed her instead of finishing his food first, because how the heck could he finish a bunch of plates in a short amount of time? That would just spoil the _goodness_. "What is it?"

Rebecca looked up. "Umm… I've been meaning to ask you this a few days ago, but I keep forgetting to." She started semi-fidgeting again. "I'm gonna just get to the point. You're good at karate, right?"

He had to be a point-dexter, he _had_ to correct her. " _Martial arts,_ yes."

"Right." She nodded and chuckled lightly. "I've been thinking, two of my female friends can fight and defend themselves. I wanna learn how to fight too."

He was sipping from his mug when she said that. He calmly placed it back down. "So you want me to train you?"

He was so forthright that it actually made her stammer. She looked down, weirdly abashed. "Well… yea…"

"Why are you embarrassed?" He tilted his head. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about."

"I mean it's just that I haven't actually _thought_ of learning self-defense, even though Lexi can fight and has a boyfriend who's won the last World Tournament. It just kinda came about when you started living here." She scratched the back of her head. "I'm sorta 'late to the game', you know."

The shy chuckle from her made Zamasu furrow his brows. "Are you actually willing to do this for the sake of self defense?" She blinked, but then she nodded. He gave it a thought, and then looked back at her. "Alright then, I will train you."

"Huh?" Rebecca blinked. She thought there was gonna be something more complex to this entire ordeal, like a lecture or something more, but he accepted her request way quicker than she had expected.

"I said I will train you. You're going to need to allot time for me to teach you how to fight, I've made note of the fact that you do have work as well."

If only she'd consider that too. Going into it Rebecca thought that she'd pull through maybe a few hours of training. But she was doctor, the woman would spend hours walking around the hospital, so maybe her workdays would be days where she couldn't train unless if she wasn't tired. But _weekends_ on the other hand; she had more than enough time to kill off. "So does that mean that you're gonna teach me how to do that thingy that Lexi can do?"

"Control your ki?"

"Yeah. That stuff." She started getting really enthusiastic. "Because I wanna learn that too."

"Don't get too excited; it takes time to control your ki." He folded his hands underneath the table. "But knowing you, I think you'll do very well in a short amount of time." It was true; Rebecca shows excellent control of her thoughts around him, so he could see her ability to focus on her ki well achieved in due time. Not only that but he assumed that since she was a doctor, she was already well accustomed with her body and where exactly her hands were. Such a thing had nothing to do with eyesight.

"How so?"

"You can control your thoughts very well." A bite out of a granola bar. "I'm certain you can exhibit the same control while emitting energy out of your hands."

She nodded, her smile getting bigger every second. "Thanks." Standing up and pushing her chair in, she clasped her hands together. "You can take your time to eat, but not too much time. We got places to go."

"What?" Oh, _right._ He hadn't realized that he would be spending time with Rebecca and the others today. Zaamsu couldn't even get angry at anyone else because he himself decided that he didn't _freaking mind_. That whole thing was entirely at his fault, had he said no he would have been able to stay in Rebecca's house in complete and utter peace.

But he didn't know that this would be the _worst,_ and best decision that he has made ever since he stepped foot on Earth. Well, second to him trying Earth food.

"You also gotta wear human clothes."

 _Oh, great._

"Don't force me to wear human clothing. Don't be like Irene." No seriously, _don't._

"I mean, I'm sure she's picked out really comfortable things for you and not things that make you look a little too sexy." She was busy casually washing her and her dogs dishes so she didn't get to see the look on Zamasu's face. "Besides, if something doesn't suit you, you can just change it up."

Ah, so she's giving him full reign to wear whatever he wanted, rather than picking out and outfit for him. That seems a bit better than what _that other woman_ did for him. "Fair enough." Even though he wanted to say 'nothing _human_ is comfortable for me', but Rebecca had already made it an unarguable declaration. She was already in the living room and walking upstairs, leaving the Kaioshin alone once more to eat and think quietly.

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So Adrian had gotten word from Lexi that Rebecca was coming along, though she did tell them that she planned on the doctor joining them prior to yesterday. You would expect him to react a certain way, seeing and having her sitting in his house once more after about a good week when James brought her in, though it felt like a longer time than that. You would expect him to decline Lexi's proposal, or even get really upset at facing Rebecca once more in his place.

But he can't do that right now, because he had just witnessed Jay get his arse handed back to him in Gang Beasts by Lexi. _Five_ times.

"She just threw you off the fucking truck!" Adrian cackled as Lexi laughed along with him. Jay's girlfriend even made a picking up gesture, like a crane would a heavy object, and then released her fingers making a 'ploop' sound. Jay glared at her.

"How dare you." Jay wasn't the one to get _that_ stingy when someone beats him in a game that's he's good at. However, he is a very competitive individual in certain circumstances, and this one was no exception; especially because the person he was versing against was Lexi, and she kicked his ass more than once, not to mention _five times_. So with every instance where his character, the blue bear, got knocked, punched, kicked, or just plain shoved off by Lexi's green fox, the stank look on his face would intensify.

"You see how my character looked at you?" She laughed. "She was like ' _uh-uh… not today._ "

"You know what, I'm starting to rethink this bet." Jay's gaze down at the ground, as if he was pondering whether or not this idea of playing this game without getting too competitive was a good one.

Let's backtrack actually; Adrian and James, the basketball player was in their kitchen doing kitchen things, opted to see the couple play a game _without_ ending up in a fight. Their fights aren't even fights; it's just the two getting competitive to the point where they _spar_ to determine who wins. This usually happens with games where you'd end up losing some of your friends after one single playthrough, like Monopoly or Candyland, the second of which gives a lot more volatile results. Initially, it seemed like they were on good terms when the four of them were playing together.

 _Initially._

As R-rated as it sounds, Adrian can't fathom sex without the both of them fighting for dominance. That might as well be their way of getting it in with the way these two compete. It's not a bad thing, it's cute; a lot of their audacious behavior is really cute until one of them blasts a wall thoroughly because the other dodged a ki blast. Hence why the music producers installed a _well-insulated_ sparring room, the idea was proposed during a fairly short conversation.

" _Jay?"_

 _His cohort-producer was busy undoing the bands in his hair. Apparently one of them got stuck, so his arms were up against his head as if he was trying to put on an unbearably tight shirt. "What is it?"_

 _Adrian looked down at his bowl of noodles, of which Jay made for him to make up for the accidental damage done to the back wall of the appliance room downstairs. Since the large yard is behind the front portion of their house, the appliance room was at the back of their house. The blast pretty much took out the entire wall and a bunch of cleaning utilities were janked up. Tapping his fingers against the end of the miso bowl, Adrian looked back up at his friend with a mental verdict, and lowkey disappointment._

" _We need to buy a training room."_

Yup. That was it, because Jay immediately agreed with Adrian right after.

Ever since then, the couple, or Adrian and he, would go there and spar. Right after a good fight they'd sit back and chill, mostly with food in the equation. Adrian would whip something up for his friend or vice versa, sometimes he'd make something for Lexi because the two would sometimes spar as well. He himself made it a mental point _not_ to spar with Lexi unless if he was willing to leave the training room soldiering on like a 75-percent dead guy, or unless if he had the physical capability that she did on a certain day. Of course, after they would spar, Lexi would sit with him or Jay and try to alleviate any aches from their bodies by massaging their arms and shoulders. The only person who's allowed to massage Lexi anywhere was Jay for obvious reasons.

James came out of the kitchen with a plate of chocolate chip cookies. "So who won that one?"

"Lexi. Again." Adrian looked back at his friend and Lexi made a frame around her face with her hands.

" _I did. He-he-he._ " The model looked back at her boyfriend, who was totally not sulking, and gave him a tender kiss on the cheek.

He didn't pull anything because he loves her, but he did complain about it because he loves her. "No no, don't _kiss_ me right after you hauled my ass in Gang Beasts!"

"But…" she gave him that taunting face that the three guys knew very well, and Adrian blinked and folded his hands together. "You got a boo-boo. I kissed it to make you feel better."

His eyes widened and even James stopped chewing cautiously, both men exchanged the same sentiment with one look. _Oh no._

" _You know what-"_ Jay shifted so that he was facing Lexi with that very-telling smirk, and Adrian had to stand up. "You think this is a game?"

"Heyyy, you guys." He crouched between the two behind the couch. "I made some cookies earlier, and James is gonna eat all of them if you two don't come through."

James sort of muttered looking down at his plate. "No I'm not-" Adrian turned around and gave James a 'GO THE FUCK WITH IT' look, and then the basketball player nodded quickly. "Ye _aaah,_ these cookies taste great guys! I mean, I can't get enough of these."

Everything the two men just said when right over the couple's ears. Lexi narrowed her eyes. "Well, we were just _playing_ a game, one that you lost to me multiple times." She smiled at her boyfriend's eye twitching. "What's wrong? Don't like losing to a woman?"

You could tell the two haven't sparred in a long time because Lexi's taunts were very forthright, and Jay wasn't doing anything to smart-mouth them. Adrian looked between the two, _This is getting worse_. "I'm sure he doesn't and I think that sucks but how about we all just eat some cookies and have a jolly old time-JAMES, BRING THE COOKIES."

"ON IT!" The basketball player made a mad dash back to the kitchen like Benny Hill, and came back out with the whole plate with a comical fast walk.

Jay breathed. "You're gonna be _wishing_ that you lost if you keep this up, honey."

"Really?" She crossed her arms. "How so? If you bring up that training room of yours, you're gonna lose the bet."

"You know damn well you've been fiending to fight me again." Jay leaned into her face.

She mirrored the same action. " _You're_ the one fiending for a fight."

"Don't put my words back on me."

"You know it's true."

"Is it?"

"Yes."

"I don't think so." Jay defiantly crossed his arms.

"Well I do." She placed her hands on her hips.

"And how are you gonna testify to that, hmm?" He reached up to tip her chin and pull her closer to him. "How are you gonna _prove me wrong?_ "

"You need a demonstration?"

"You're not helping your case at all. And I am not helping yours either." Jay rolled his sleeves up. He was making a point of saying that Lexi wanted to fight him, but he wasn't actively trying to stop her from provoking him.

Lexi cracked her knuckles. "Who said I wanted you to?"

"HERE ARE THE COOKIES!" James went in front of the two and crouched down with the full plate of freshly baked and warm cookies. "Lookit, see? They're all warm and toasty and sweet smelling like… do you guys _not_ smell the chocolate on them?! It's just… mmm…" Jame stopped in the middle of him trying to deviate both their attention from what they desired just to eat one cookie. And he didn't eat quickly, he took his sweet as time because it tasted so friggin good.  
"James, you fucking idiot- Guys!" Adrian snapped his fingers in front of the two and that instantly made Jay raise his hand at Adrian, palm facing the ceiling with a ball of energy slowly forming above his hand.

"Quit snapping your fingers in my face. We're not hungry." Jay retracted his ki once Adrian moved backwards.

Lexi moved Adrian's hand out of the way. "No, we _aren't_."

The two weren't even making eye contact with either Adrian or James. James looked at Adrian and stood up, shrugging as if he had given up. "There's no hope, bro."

Lexi got up and walked right past James, not even looking at the cookies. "It's been a long time since I got a chance to fight you."

A pause. And then Jay finally broke. "Alright, that's it." Jay stood up as well, slapping his hands against his thighs. "Fuck this bet, we're ranking."

"Shit." Adrian sighed. Before Jay could follow his girlfriend, he held his friend's shoulders to stop him from walking. "Can y'all just sit in here and play video games normally without having to fight each other?"

The model turned around to find Adrian's back in front of where Jay was standing. "What's the fun in that, Adri? It's not like we're gonna fight _in the house_ , we're going to the training room."

"But-"

Jay moved his friend's hands down. "Listen, you two don't need to worry. I know what I'm doing."

Adrian frowned. "If you two end up breaking the walls of that giant ass room, you guys are paying for it. I'm not making no shares for any of this."

"No problem." Jay shrugged and went past Adrian, who looked on partially concerned.

"Well… I tried." He crossed his arms and sighed, and James came to stand right beside him.

"You really think you could stop those two from sparring? They practically grew up with martial arts, especially Jay." The basketball player was eating the cookies nonchalantly, and he made a sound of satisfaction. "Geez dude, these taste good as hell…"

"Thanks." Adrian stole a glance from James, and looked at the plate of cookies. He kept looking back at it, the sweet smell of his own handiwork getting to him slowly. "You know what, lemme get one." He took a cookie from the plate and ate it, lowkey surprised at how _hecking good_ it tastes. He took another, and James gave him a cross look.

"Fam, don't finish all of them!"

"I only took two, fatass." Adrian gave him a straight face. "Besides, _I_ made all of that, and it's not all for you."

"Okay, fair enough." James walked away with the plate still in his hands. "How about we both eat these while watching them fight?"

The training room had a prep room along with it where those who walked in could prepare themselves and what not before they fought. It also had windowed walls so that people can witness a fight in there. Even though Adrian technically tried to stop the two from sparring once again and failed, it's not like he _wouldn't_ be interested in seeing how their session turns out. So he looked at James who was sharing the same thought process as he did, and nodded.

"Fuck it, we'll watch."

i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i¨i

Zamasu was sitting in Rebecca's car, still mentally working out whether or not this was a good idea for him. They have been driving for ten minutes and Rebecca made a quick stop in between that time to pick up something for Loki. And in that considerable amount of time, Zamasu was too busy rethinking his decision even though he can't do anything about it without making a fuss. It was his choice, his accidental choice, to join in with Lexi's plans, so he decided to take responsibility for him 'not minding anything'.

There was one good thing about all of this; Zamasu did eat prior to leaving the house. When he got dressed, Rebecca told him that even though he probably didn't want to go, he should come along with her and Lexi and the other guys regardless. She thought it'd be great for him to become well acquainted with other people, namely guys for that matter.

She entered the car once again with a bag of snacks and another white bag, plopping down on her driver's seat and apologizing to Zamasu for taking more time she'd anticipated. He was okay with that, he'll allow Rebecca to take her time.

"Why should I become well acquainted with other people?"

Rebecca reared off the parking lot. "Well, you've only have conversations with other females, like I've never seen you talk to a dude before- besides James, of course. I want you to have some… _guy_ acquaintances."

The actual weight of what was about to happen dawned on her before she left her house. Yes, there was a possibility that Zamasu could be cool with the guys as well, and yes, those three want little to nothing to do with the doctor. Seeing how accepting she was of this would have confused someone who paid much attention to the dynamic of the group, which she reckoned Zamasu did whenever he went out. Although she'd be lying to herself if she said that she _didn't_ want Zamasu's scope of communication to grow. It sounded really selfish, but she liked how closed off and simple he was. Keeping him at her house with the only person he could talk to being her gave him little to no reason to be going out to other people. Especially because he doesn't know that many people very well in the first place.

Although, when she did think about it, she could use this _bridging_ of the males as an opportunity.

Zamasu nodded, looking down at the car's floor. "You want me to be acquainted with them?"

Rebecca frowned and looked at him. "Yeah? Why?"

"Something tells me that you don't like them." Rather something _screamed_ to him that she didn't like them, and that they returned the sentiment. Lexi looked like the person bridging things between the guys and Rebecca and he, if it weren't for the really pretty model, none of this would ever take place. In fact, if it weren't for Lexi, the next two days wouldn't be indubitably stupid.

Indubitably stupidly _entertaining_.

"Well… I kinda don't." She sounded so unsure to the Kaioshin, to the average person it would be dished off as her partially disliking them.

"Kind of?"

"Okay, I don't _not like_ them. But I don't hate them, either. Not anymore." Rebecca consciously chose open-ended words, just to hear what Zamasu had to say. Just to hear if he _would_ say anything.

"Not anymore?" He raised a brow. "Something happened?" This would be the perfect time for the Kaioshin to assess all the discoveries and the perplexing things he'd found through mere images. It's not like he was into drama, he really wasn't, but he could see that the incident in which changed the way she was had something to do with Adrian. Although, he was intrigued to find out why she didn't like the other two, namely Jay because James seems like nothing but trouble to the Kaioshin.

Rebecca could have smirked if she wanted to. She was a little brighter now that he was interested in what she had to say, but she kept her words objective. "Something happened between me and the three of them." A tap on her steering wheel. "Stuff that I did. They don't find it forgivable, hence why we keep our distance."

It was like two different narratives, and Rebecca nonchalantly said the both of them as if to give both parties a sense of responsibility for their aversion. Her doing something led to them not liking her, and them being too stingy to forgive her led to her being a bit of an outcast from the group if her two staple girls, Irene and Lexi, were not there.

Zamasu didn't know of all of that, he just left the statement at its surface. "So I assume Lexi just wants them to talk to you?"

"I guess." She kept her outer narrative inquisitive, but she knew that Lexi was doing this to show her that these guys didn't _hate_ her. The amount of times the model would say that sounded promising, but the doctor has been around them longer than Lexi has. She _knows_ how they roll. "But they're nice guys, they really are. I'm sure they'll accept you in no time."

Surprisingly enough, she said that with no envy or mischief present in her voice. It was nowhere near envious in her mind, in fact she saw it as a _positive thing_. "Do you mind telling me where we have to go?"

"Lexi told me that she's at Adrian and Jay's house. That's where I'm heading off to. If ya didn't know, both Adrian and Jay live together."

They _live_ together? He recalled back at Stonecold when those two men sounded akin to an old couple, and he knew what old couples sounded like because of movies. It makes sense. To hear that they live together sounded like there'd be a fight every single day.

Meanwhile, Jay was busy sparring with his girlfriend, so technically Zamasu's guess wasn't really wrong.

"Is Lexi already there?" Her name sounded nice, especially when it came out of his mouth. He purposely kept his thoughts at bay because he has to spend a whole day in her presence. May Kami help him, because he might say something really stupid or agree to something _he doesn't want to do._

"When she called me she was there." Rebecca looked at her meter; they'd be at his house in a couple minutes. "Why? You miss her already?"

" _No."_ He shook his head. "I'm just _asking_."

Rebecca shrugged. "Well I'm just saying, because you usually wouldn't care about the whereabouts of someone. But it seems like Lexi's breaking down those 'not give a fuck' walls without even trying."

And that's so goddamn true, Zamasu couldn't even object to what she said. But that doesn't mean he was going to remain silent and let her win. "I think it'd be reasonable to have your female friend with you if you're around three men who aren't fond of you."

A pause between the two, and then she snickered. " _Fair play_."

Rebecca looked in front; the house was in front of them. She didn't realize that their gate was open, which could've been a safety hazard but the music producers did not live in a heavily populated place. In fact, their closest neighbors were probably half a mile away, because where they live happens to be a large place of many acres. Their house was tech-savvy, as expected, and there was a large building behind their house within the gate of their home. Their own gates gave a bit more space to the inside of the place compared to Rebecca's, but their house wasn't as big as Rebecca's mansion.

"I'm just gonna roll in, and hopefully Lexi will answer the door." She got out of the car after she parked in the tiny lot that was in front of Adrian's home. Zamasu followed suit, looking down at his outfit. He actually was wearing something comfortable; his pants were black jeans, he had white sneakers on, but he didn't change the top of his gi. Rebecca did object to him possibly being a little too hot in that outfit, but he digressed by telling her that weather doesn't get to him as much as it does with humans. Rebecca rang the doorbell and crossed her arms, tapping her foot against the floor. Why does she look impatient already?

Several seconds, give or take, the door opened to reveal James, a person that the _both_ of them were not savvy with right now. He had an eaten cookie in his hand and he was chewing so his voice was muffled, and he blinked when the two were presented to him. "Oh, you guys are here." He swallowed and gave them both a sweet smile. "C'mon in. Take your shoes off-"

"Who was it?" Adrian's voice could be heard somewhere off inside the house and james turned his head all the way back.

"It's Rebecca and Zamasu." James took another bite of his cookie, and motioned for the two to come in. The both of them did step inside, Zamasu taking a quick scan of the entire place before him while he removed his shoes. Rebecca just continued walking in. "Lexi said they were coming. Did you forget that?"

"Bro, I thought it was someone else. I've been having people come in here oftentimes this week." Adrian had a plate of cookies in his hand and he smiled when he saw Zamasu. "Yoooo, Zamasu! What's good, how are you doin- hold on, lemme put this down."

"I got it." James reached out to take the plate and Adrian held his hand up at the man.

"You ate almost half this entire plate. I'ma put it here, don't touch." He placed the plate on their modern looking coffee table, and went back to give Zamasu a handshake. Zamasu shook his hand; since the Kaioshin has been exposed to very amicable behavior, he half-expected Adrian to do that weird 'lock motion' thing that he does with James. It was called a dap, but Zamasu doesn't know that.

Adrian looked at Rebecca, noticing how she still had her arms crossed but her feet weren't tapping the floor. She smiled at him. "Hey, Adrian."

He gave her a casual look and the same smile that he gave Zamasu. That made the Kaioshin frown. "Hi, Rebecca." He held his hand out to shake hers, but just as he did so she simultaneously walked deeper into his living room, she didn't move her arms at all. "So you're just gonna leave me hanging like that?"

She chuckled and gave him a half-smile. "You know I don't do handshakes."

 _That's strange._ Zamasu would have expected Rebecca to return back and give him something other than a handshake, but she didn't. She masked her actions with a simple chuckle and her body language was more coy and playful, but all of that was a mask. She simply did not want to reciprocate a physical greeting, and Zamasu wondered if Adrian caught that as well. The Kaioshin didn't even see any sardonic undertone behind Adrian's actions, he was simply cordially greeting her. Rebecca sure has vocally greeted him back, but even Zamasu knew that leaving a handshake out was very subversive.

Adrian placed a hand on his hip and blinked multiple times. He didn't look irritated, his face just said 'Oh. Alrighty then'. That was the vibe Zamasu got from him and it was amusing in a sense. "Anyways, how have you been?"

Zamasu looked at him and shrugged. "I've been fine."

"You came just in time, by the way." James emerged behind him eating the last bits of his cookie. "Adrian just made some bomb ass cookies."

Adrian narrowed his eyes. "They didn't come _just in time_. We were supposed to play video games or something. All six of us."

 _Six?_

James had his hands on his hips. He wasn't puffing his chest out like he did before, especially in the presence of the Kaioshin, nor was he trying to look dominant. Zamasu realized that this man was now as chill and neutral as his friend. "It should have been six, but the other two went off to fight, and we were just about to go and watch them."

"They're fighting?" Zamasu frowned. "Why are they fighting?"

"Sparring, to be exact." James scratched his chiseled and stubbled chin. "Me and Adrian challenged the two to play a video game without getting competitive and it didn't go so well. Long story short, they decided to spar to determine who the real winner is."

Adrian shrugged. "They both lost, anyways." That made both men snort, and Zamasu raised a brow.

"Oh?" He looked around. "They're fighting in this house?"

"They're in our training room. If you want, I'll bring you in and you can watch them fight with us."

You know what, Zamasu concurred that this wasn't gonna be as bad as he thought. Not because he likes violence, but because he'll actually get a chance to see the two fight. It'd be a great opportunity see just how good these two happen to be, _Lexi_ in particular. "That's fine by me."

"Aight. Come'ere." Adrian turned to a hallway right after the living room. James and Zamasu both got their shoes, and joined him. He turned around, looking at Rebecca who had caught sight of all three of them walking somewhere else. "You wanna watch too?"

"The spar?" She asked.

"Yup." James nodded, and she wordlessly shrugged and walked with them.

They had to leave the house through the back door. It led to an open field with a large, white insulated building. Adrian pressed his hand against a black pad right next to the sliding door and the door slid open, revealing a room with two other doors. There was nothing hanging on the walls for reasons, but the room looked well-pampered and clean; the floor was polished dark oak wood and the walls were ivory white with dark oak accents. Adrian opened the door to their left, which led to a small corridor several feet long and into a room with all the fighting paraphernalia and seats for those within to watch. There was a glass walled window so that they could get a full higher view of the actual sparring room which was _really really big_ , and from the looks of the outer portion of the walls Zamasu could tell that this stainless glass was at least one foot in thickness.

"There they go." Adrian pointed. Zamasu looked on to see Lexi looking on, facing away from them. Jay rushed in front of her and they both started barraging one another with hits. Zamasu didn't think that humans could throw hits at one another _that_ fast. It wasn't superhuman level, or maybe it was, he didn't know, but it was hard to tell if either one of the two were making concrete hits. However, he could indicate that Jay was on the offense and Lexi the opposite, just because he noticed her blocking and evading stance while Jay was throwing the punches.

"Wait a minute." Adrian leaned inwards. "Is she pacing him?"

A blink. He knew what Adrian meant. "I believe so."

Lexi was on heavy defense at the moment, she was trying to get Jay tired so that she score a hit on him. Lexi swerved a hit from him and kicked his back, sending him flying backward several feet. Jay didn't hit the floor, he he front flipped in the middle of being airborne, landed on his feet, and zoomed straight at her. She moved over to the side evading his open palm, but he swung around and elbowed her back. The model stumbled, turning just in time to hold a fist that could have made contact with her chest. Lexi was sliding backwards from the force of his fist which was still in her hand, she kept her ground not allowing him to overtake her until she finally pushed him off with a backflip. While airborne, she threw a small ki blast at him and Jay backflipped onto his hands and back on his feet.

Zamasu was sitting down with both his elbows on the table and his hands folded together below his chin in amazement. There was no ill intention in their fighting, it even looked like they were dancing with how well the two seemed to know one another's fighting styles. Zamasu could see that Lexi was switching between Ken Do and Taekwondo most of the time, and Jay stayed consistent with his styles. Meanwhile, Rebecca noticed that Zamasu's attention was _entirely_ on the two within the dojo. She herself watched as her female friend was putting up a hefty amount of challenge for her boyfriend. Lexi moved so fluidly, it was as if their fight, her moves, were orchestrated, she just knew when and where to strike whenever. Rebecca wondered just what was going through her mind to make her execute such movement without skipping a beat, and she came to the realization that perhaps all of what the both of them were doing required little to no thought. They were so good at fighting that they didn't need to _think_.

How could she ever be like that? Rebecca couldn't remember the last time she had consciously shut off her thoughts for more than a minute. Is it even possible to do that during a fight? But then again, Jay grew up with martial arts and Lexi's been training since she was a teen, they both are forces to be reckoned with. Could it be possible that within the span of less than a year she would somewhat look less… meek? Because that's the impression she gets from other people if they harass her; they think she's some small individual who can't defend herself, and at the moment that is technically true. _It's not gonna be true once he starts training me_. She looked back at Zamasu, his eyes were _glued_ to the fight in front of him and she wondered if he was only paying attention to Lexi, or if his attention was equally distributed between the two.

She highly doubted the latter.

"How long have they been fighting?" Zamasu asked.

"I think… thirty minutes before you guys came." Adrian leaned back but then leaned forward again with an 'ooooh' when he saw Jay take an opened palm to his chest, sending him flying backwards.

"I don't think they know that we're here." James stood up and went to the adjacent wall to the right. He pressed a button and then yelled ' _HEY'_ into a bunch of dots on this little device that Zamasu didn't know was called a microphone.

Both Lexi and Jay turned to where the watchroom was, because that's where sounds like that would always come from, in mid-strike. Her foot was close to his face and his foot was close to hers. Jay lowered his leg and placed his hand on his hips, saying something to Lexi and then they both walked forward wiping sweat off of their faces. The two disappeared the view when they got closer to where they were, and in a short amount of time, a door slid open to reveal the couple. There weren't any bruises on either of them, and what they were wearing was great attire for fighting.

Adrian stood up. "So who won?"

"Well, we couldn't figure that out because y'all interrupted us." Jay smirked. "But I think I did."

" _I don't think so_." Lexi was holding a towel in her hand, patting her face. Zamasu lowkey… highkey was trying to find every mental excuse to look somewhere else. "You know what, I'll hand it to you this time, hun."

She gave him a sweet kiss on the cheek and right at that moment Rebecca looked at Zamasu. The Kaioshin gave her the most scornful look he could ever produce because he knew the trail of thought that was running through her mind. _Oh look they're kissing, that's gonna make me jealous-_ well, it didn't make him any bit jealous, in fact it never will because Zamasu knows his limits. He knows that she's some human woman, just some random regular _superhuman-ish_ woman with a pretty face but that doesn't change the fact that she's a member of an ugly species. So by that logic, since Zamasu hated humans equally, he shouldn't even be _trying_ to avoid eye contact with her because she's just as ugly as everyone else.

 _But she's really pretty…_

How contradicting is it to hate humans equally, yet the one that happened to catch his eyes happened to be some really pretty human woman?

Zamasu shook his head; he is one conflicted individual.

"'Ey, Zamasu." Jay walked up to him and proceeded to shake his hand. Zamasu held a hand out to shake, immediately reminded of the _stuff_ that he wanted to talk to this man about. He'll wait until the two are settled in to do all of that. Jay leaned to the side to see Rebecca behind everyone else, she was greeting his girlfriend cordially. " _Oy_."

That made both women look at him. Jay's focus on was on Rebecca. "So you're just _not_ gonna say hi to me?"

"Oh." Rebecca giggled apologetically, but that _fake as fuck and Jay knew it._ "Hiiii, Jay." To extend her apology, she went over and gestured a hug and he raised his hands. "Uhh, I'm highkey sweaty. I don't think you'd wanna hug me at the moment."

"Oh, right." She looked down with a tiny smirk and turned back to Lexi who smiled at the two. Jay just raised a brow, and right after caught Zamasu looking at him. Then the other two males looked at each other. The Kaioshin, James, he and Adrian exchanged looks at one another before Lexi finally spoke up again.

"So," Lexi clasped her hands together, "You guys wanna stay here for a bit or are we gonna go out somewhere?"

"We're gonna stay and prolly' play something to pass time." Adrian looked at Jay.

Lexi nodded. "Okay. I'ma go take a quick shower because I'm really sweaty. You guys wouldn't wanna see that so…"

"Me too." Jay raised his hand. "I'm out-"

"Wait! I said I was going first!" Lexi fast walked in front of him to block his way.

"I was thinking about _going together_ , you know." Jay raised his arms with a brewing smile on his face. He spoke quietly enough for only her to hear him.

"Oh, _well okay then._ " She turned around and opened the door for the both of them to leave.

Once the door closed, Adrian nodded _knowingly_. "Yup. They're gonna end up making out in the house somewhere." James harrumphed, and Adrian shot him a look. " _Anyways,_ you guys wanna go back and play something else?"

James nodded. "I'm down. Zamasu." The Kaioshin looked at him. "You ever played a video game before?"

The expected answer was given. "A what?"

James didn't even stop to explain what it was, he just went straight on. "Alright, lemme show you how to play."

They left the training room and into the actual house. It seems as though both Jay and Lexi went directly upstairs to shower. Everyone assumed that they'd be back down in half an hour since they thought that the couple would be _taking turns_. Zamasu looked around the place; it was very clean and highly technological. Their mere coffee table even had lights in it, it wasn't an infinity table or anything, it just had lights, and their modern sectional had built in ledges to put random stuff on. Their TV was big and mounted like Rebecca's, the only thing that made it different was that it was _curved_ which Zamasu found weird, and there were game systems with well organized wires behind it. One of them resembled the one that Irene had and the other, which was a PC with top-notch gaming specs, was unfamiliar to him. The walls were light blue and the lights were flush with the ceiling, and the decorations looked rather cool. There was this color changing crystal light mounted on the wall with a dark oak frame around it that reminded him of the table in his room. The guys made sure to take their shoes off before sitting down to chill on the sofa.

James sat down while Adrian turned on one of the systems and then grabbed three controllers. After a short amount of time, the screen faded into a nice gradient blue-purple with a bunch of selections of games. Zamasu unintentionally kept a space open between him and the basketball player, and Adrian sat on the opposite side of where that space was. It was completely coincidental that the three inadvertently sat in comfortable spaces from one another, with a seat in between Zamasu and James left for Rebecca to sit in. She instead chose to sit on the adjacent side of the sectional, away from the three guys.

"What's a good game for him to start off with?" Adrian was mostly asking himself that question.

"Speedrunners. That'd be a good start."

"Oh _no_ …" Adrian looked at James and shook his head. If anyone should know a thing about Speedrunner, it's that it is probably the most competitive game possible. Adrian hoped that this wouldn't spark any interest from the Kaioshin beside him-

"What is that?" Zamasu inquired of course, because while luck doesn't work him, it apparently doesn't work for Adrian either.

" Speedrunners?" Adrian looked at the green guy to his right. "It's a game where you gotta race other people."

"It's legit just you running through a bunch of platforms and you have power to knock other players off the screen." James got up and looked at the producer. "Dude it's not like he's gonna start sizing up to you automatically. This is his first time playing."

"Well exactly. So I'ma let you teach him." Adrian crossed his arms and reclined into his seat, seeing James frown for a moment.

The basketball player then nodded. "Okay then. So, Zamasu." James grabbed a controller and selected Speedrunners, the cover of which looked like a couple people dashing at very fast speed. Zamasu didn't realize that there was a space between where he and James sat until the man stood up. "Basically, you just run around a platform multiple times until everyone else is out of the screen. The screen itself will get smaller and smaller so you gotta keep up with the pace."

"Yup." Adrian nodded. At this point, Speedrunners had fully loaded up and the two controllers that were online now were connected. They lit up with lights underneath its buttons; one was green and the other was red. "But I gotta warn you though, it's really fast paced."

"Not when no one else is challenging you. You guys want something to drink?" At this point, James was in the kitchen. "We got like, I dunno: orange juice, water, tea… the heck is this?" James pulled some bottle of translucent white liquid out the fridge and held it out for the others to see. The wall that divided the kitchen and the living room had doors that could open and close, giving the others a view of what a portion of the kitchen looked like.

"Huh?" Adrian frowned. "Oh… that's coconut pineapple juice."

"Who bought this?"

"That was Jay but you guys can have some if you like." Adrian motioned to the other two quiet individuals. "Zamasu, whatcha want?"

It's weird to see how complacent he was with the other guys because his response was "You had me at _tea._ I'd like to know what kind of tea is in there." Rebecca looked between the trio: the two sitting on the couch and the other in the kitchen. Yup, they were gonna get along very quickly. Video games and food have a powerful way of stopping conflicts between men.

"They're all cold teas by the way." Zamasu didn't expect James to speak, he was thinking that Adrian would tell him what was in his fridge. But the basketball player spoke anyway. "There's green tea, earl tea, iced, peach, mango- there's actually a lot. So which one you want?"

 _Peach tea?_ "I guess I'll go with peach." He never tried fruit flavored tea before and it piqued his curiosity as to how it would taste.

Okay no, let's backtrack for a second; this is the same man who wouldn't step out of his comfort zone for _anything_ other than whatever is put to him. Now, he had choices, he could have just went with the tea that he's _used to_ drinking but instead decided to _try something new._ Something as little as choosing peach tea would be the predecessor to his experiences within the next three weeks of not being under Irene's roof.

But he didn't know that. He wasn't even thinking about that at the moment.

James nodded. "Alright. Adrian, what about you?"

"Gimme the _yoozh._ " Adrian smirked knowingly at James.

"The ' _yoozh'_?" Zamasu raised the brow.

"He means 'the usual'." James was already fishing out what the _yoozh_ apparently was which was a flavored sparkling water drink. The flavor was pomegranate blueberry and it tastes _hella good_ , to put in accurate words.

"Rebecca, what ya want?" Adrian turned to the quietest person who, if Zamasu wasn't intuitive enough, could have left the house without anyone else noticing. She was sitting with her legs tightly closed and in a straight posture yet she looked, and was, very reserved. The doctor had a pillow in her lap too, it was a clean green hue.

"I'll take the coconut pineapple juice." Rebecca spoke, making _dead-eye_ contact with Adrian. Her voice was quiet and almost inaudible, but it was neutral. There was no positive evocation nor any scorn in her voice, it was so neutral that it was borderline monotonous.

Adrian nodded just as slowly as the word "Okaaaaaay" came out of his mouth in an uptalk. "James, coconut pineapple for the lady!"

"Got it." The basketball came towards the inner kitchen door-window facing the others with three different bottles of cold beverages. "Chug?"

"Chug." Adrian said, and James tossed it across the room for the other man to catch with one hand. Zamasu watched the exchange between the two until James called his name.

"Zamasu, can you catch?"

The Kaioshin gave him a look. "Why would you throw a beverage across a room? Can't you just hand it to him?"

Zamasu wasn't gonna try _everything_ new, of course.

"I would but… _nahhh._ " James shrugged and shook his head, making the Kaioshin roll his eyes. But not really in a bad way, it was more out of amusement. "I got other drinks to hold, you know?"

"And you'd throw a God's beverage across this room?" Zamasu narrowed his eyes. He had to establish the definite eye-glaring fact that he was a God. Why would you throw a bottle of peach tea at the dang God of Creation?

"I said I'd _toss_ it..."

Correction: _toss_.

"..But okay, I'll hand yours to ya." James held both Zamasu's bottle and his in one arm, and Rebecca's glass of juice in the other. He walked over to where Rebecca was to hand hers first. He held the glass out for her to take and she give him a weird look but took it out of his hands anyway.

James went around the back of the sectional couch to sit back in his seat. The space between the man and the God didn't get shorter. "Here."

The peach tea bottle was actually seethrough, Zamasu could see that the tea inside was a peachy yellow color. He frowned at the bottle, it was cold and there was tea encapsulated in it. Why would you put tea in a bottle? He was so used to having it out and ready in a teacup. "Oh." Zamasu twisted the cap and opened the bottle, taking tiny sip while James and Adrian popped their bottles open along with the Kaioshin. Rebecca sat adjacent to them, and she noticed that the three males opened and drank their beverages almost simultaneously. Zamasu finalized his sip and swallowed, looking down at the bottle…

Let's just say that he might end having a thing for cold teas, to sum it all up.

"Okay so, I just chose a map for the both of us and Imma teach you how to play, see if you can get the hang of it." James chuckled which made Zamasu furrow a brow at the man, but James waved it off as nothing. "So, I guess you don't need to really choose a character yet, you're just learning the basics." James went through the characters himself, however. "I'm still gonna use the Falcon because why not."

Adrian straightfaced. "Really? You're gonna tell him not to look through the characters and you just do that yourself?"

"It took me like two seconds to get him anyway." James shrugged. Zamasu looked through the characters pretty quickly as well. He saw one that happened to be a cat with a golden bell and a red scarf by the name of Maneko Neko. Since he likes animals, and that was the only one that caught his eye, he chose it.

"I like this one." Zamasu was a simple man; he sees an animal, he picks the animal.

"Oh wow, he's the cat." James nodded in lowkey approval of his choice.

"Maneko Neko, bro?" Adrian snickered. "I wouldn't expect you to go for that."

"That's Lexi's favorite one to use, too." James took a sip of his fruity water. "She _always_ picks that one and I always question why she picks it every dang time."

Zamasu could have face-fucking-palmed right now. _Are you kidding me right now?_

Adrian laughed while Zamasu quietly looked down at the ground because _dammit man,_ can't he catch a break? Every freaking time he would completely forgotten all semblance of 'strange' feelings he'd have for her, something has to happen to pull him back into that confusing, contradicting, convoluted whirlpool of feelings that he definitely doesn't want to deal with. The Kaioshin looked very calm, and in fact answered the two men normally.

"Really?" He asked Adrian with the tinge of a smirk showing fake amusement.

"Yup. Cats are her favorite animals." Zamasu chuckled, but he was internally kickboxing himself for accidentally finding something that somehow related to the model. You may be asking, does he even know how to kickbox?

As a skilled martial artist in almost every form of martial arts there is, that question would be very offensive to a Kai who's lived longer than the amount of times humans have been created and destroyed a bunch of times over. Just letting you know, if you happened to be asking that question.

"Alrighty, we're all set. Lemme show you how this runs." Another random chuckle from James and Adrian facepalmed, somehow getting something that the Kaioshin wasn't. James showed him how to run and maneuver around the map, as well as grapple onto certain spaces that the characters could swing from. He showed him how to boost, which was to run into the tiny blue fields scattered around the map, and how to throw rockets and meteors and stuff of that nature to thwart any opposition. Obviously, due to Zamasu's high intelligence, he caught the whiff of everything rather quickly.

But during that time, Zamasu noticed that James was somewhat… different. The man didn't seem to look at him in a nefarious way like he did when he was with Irene, nor did he try to pick a fight or try to underhand him in any way. James was genuinely being nice, there was nothing fishy about his actions either. The Kaioshin didn't know what thought process took place for this man to be cool with him after breaking Irene's glass door. To be fair, it was James' fault in the first place, he should have never touched Zamasu. That's the last thing you want to do, unless if this green God gives you the permission, you don't ever _push_ a person like him.

He wondered if this was a facade, if James was as good at putting up faces as Jay was. Perhaps the Kaioshin could be wrong, of _way off_ , but time will tell if he's right or not. The last twenty minutes of tutorial-esque gameplay went from Zamasu learning how to play, to him actually playing, to James testing him to see if he had understood what was taught to him. According to the two times that Zamasu ended up beating James in the test run, it's fair to say that he understood the material _very well_.

"Well shit." James looked at his controller, and then at Zamasu. "How'd you get so good all of the sudden?"

"I'm a Kaio. We learn things quickly." Was his simple answer.

" _Pfft_ , okay then. I think we can 1v1 at this point." James shrugged with anticipation, seeing that Zamasu was already showing that he was competition material. James selected a different map and picked his all-time favorite again, the Falcon. Zamasu went with something different, because a particular name caught his eye.

"...Veloci...T-Rex?" The Kaioshin raised a brow. "They have dinosaurs racing humans and cats too?"

That made Adrian snort, and Rebecca even cracked a chuckle.

"The correct name is _Velociraptor_." James held his hand out with in a spice gesture.

"That actually sounds a lot better than that other name." That Zamasu wouldn't want to pronounce at the moment. Velociraptor sounds better.

They were in a particular map called the Plaza, that of which James said was an intermediate map. They played through it, James having the upper hand due to having played the game way longer than Zamasu has. Rebecca sat there wondering how guys and gamers in general manage to keep up such a smooth pace without messing up. She could never get the hang of video games and even Zamasu was doing a better job at that than her. Watching her little brother slide, glide, run and shoot in a screen would confuse her greatly, and that kid is only 15.

They were actually keeping up on each other to the point where the screen started getting smaller. Zamasu, being the Velociraptor was insanely quick-witted playing against James, who was agile from longer exposure. At some point, the Kaioshin had gotten the upper hand, he had completely memorized the entire track, and the screen was so small that if one of them stopped running, they'd lose automatically. And that's what Zamasu did, by accident, because his finger missed a button and he felt off the screen, leaving James to be the victor.

"Dayum, geez you're actually really good." James looked at him. "Are you sure this is your first time playing?"

"This is his first time holding a controller too." Rebecca added on.

" _What?!_ " Adrian looked on in shock. "Okay, you know what- I'm joining this. Get the other controller James."

James shook his head, getting up to get another controller. " _Oooh_ , there is no way Zamasu can beat you. I mean, he came close with me but then he missed a button."

"You can't be missing buttons when you're playing against me." Adrian smirked, and Zamasu could see the playful competition between the two men. The vibes that they were giving off were starting to rub off on him, making him just as competitive as the two. Well, that's another thing that Zamasu was; a competitive person under the right environment.

"And what makes you say that?" Zamasu raised a brow.

"Because Adrian is _the best_ speedrunner out of all of us." James made a circle motion with his hands, passing a controller to Adrian. This one had blue lights. "If you can't beat me, then you definitely can't beat Adrian."

"Who says I can't?" Zamasu turned to him, and James cocked his neck back.

"Oh, _really_?" James blinked. "Okay, I'll put on a harder map for this guy."

They decided to pick the Silo, an advanced map. Adrian went with the Flamenco, James chose the Fort Knight, and Zamasu was still the Velociraptor. Rebecca blinked. "Don't you guys think you're being a little too hard on him for his first time?"

"Rebecca, it's fine." Zamasu had this rare smirk on his face that only arose whenever he found a suitable challenge. For the time being, this may as well be one. "It won't take long for me to beat these two."

Zamasu's thumb gesture made the other men turned to him with looks on their faces and Zamasu gave them both a look back. All three of them turned to the screen and the second the words 'Go' disappeared on the screen, all three of them paid heavy attention to their runners. They were all leaned in to the screen, swinging and gliding and running through the platform with ease. Five minutes have passed, and all three of them were still going strong. Zamasu was grappling onto a platform and swinging, at the same time a thought crossed his mind and he flickered his gaze towards James.

"Is _this_ what you meant by 'getting the hang of' the game?"

James laughed and nodded. " _Yeaah_ , I didn't think you'd catch on that quickly."

"If you wanna know something about James," Adrian's eyes were on the screen, "He 'accidentally' spouts out puns at random."

James objected immediately. "I don't spout them out, I just let them... _slide_."

Zamasu actually snorted. He actually snorted at hearing a pun. "I have no problem with them." Zamasu didn't know the stigma behind puns, so Rebecca shook her head silently.

"There is really nothing wrong with them to be honest." Adrian shrugged. "A lot of them are lowkey funny. It's just that when James does it, of all people-"

"My puns are _fine_." James glanced at Adrian and then looked at the screen.

"Riiight, I agree." No he didn't.

"You know what," Zamasu spoke calmly between the two, "I think it's time for James to get a…" The Velociraptor Zamasu was playing as used the grapple to pull the Fort Knight backwards, making James fall out of the screen. " _Grip._ "

"Really?!" James shot a look at the Kaioshin who just smirked. Adrian couldn't hold his chuckle in at how _bad_ , and how _good_ that pun was.

"Yes, really- no!" It was at that moment that a random meteor (one that Adrian shot at him) hit Zamasu making him fall out of the screen and leaving Adrian as the winner of the round. "Oh, you little-"

"I won." Adrian did this little dance. "But the game's not over. We're starting again." The characters respawned in the same area that Adrian was in and they continued their race. This time, it ended a bit faster than before. Zamasu had lost first, James seconded that, and Adrian was the victor again.

"That's 2-0-0." James said, pointing at the scoreboard above. "The first person to 3 wins."

"Three?!" Zamasu exclaimed. How was he supposed to beat this man when _one_ little slip up could make him win? The Kaioshin had to be strategic, he will not be beaten, _not this day_.

Although he did, except James won this time. And then after that, Zamasu actually did win, the whole time the guys would randomly bring up taunts and jokes that would provoke one another to trying harder. There was, as expected, room for puns and riddles too.

"I find dry erase boards to be quite remarkable." Snorts and chuckles erupted for the human males.

"You guys ever sang in the shower?" Adrian had asked, and both guys said no. "It's pretty fun to be honest."

"Sure shit, it's fun until you get body wash in your mouth." James furrowed his brows.

Zamasu smirked. "Then it becomes a soap opera." The three ended up snickering like scheming idiots.

Adrian shook his head. "Ohh, wait until Jay comes down and gets a load of this."

Rebecca groaned loudly, and that brought the attention onto her momentarily. James smiled. "Rebecca hates this- she acute wants to smack all three of us right now."

"Why?" Zamasu frowned, eyes not leaving the screen but his face did turn towards James.

"Because I hate puns." Rebecca crossed her arms, she looked very dissatisfied.

"All puns?" The Kaioshin looked at her.

"Yes, every single one; job puns, food puns, insect puns, you name it. Everything."

"Wow," Adrian made a hiss sound at that. He then smirked and nudged Zamasu's arm. "I could see that this really… _bugs_ her."

James chimed in hearing the other two males laugh. "What's with all the _buzz?"_

"You guys are so annoying." Rebecca looked away from all of them. Adrian paused the game and went to go sit next to her.

"Why so serious?" He playfully placed a hand on her shoulder and she quickly pushed it off of her. "We're all having fun here and you're just sitting all quiet and irritated."

"I already told you why." She didn't make eye contact with him. "I don't like puns."

Even though he was joking, Adrian wasn't talking about that. She's been acting like that ever since she stepped foot into his house. James and Zamasu looked at the two silently and then they exchanged looks, which was something that the Kaioshin never thought he'd do with the basketball player.

" _Smile_." Adrian leaned to the side to see her face, and she was _refraining_ from cracking even a grimace at him. "C'mon, it's the weekend for crying out loud. Loosen up."

"No. It shouldn't even matter anyway." She accidentally broke, a flicker of a smile cracked on her lips and Adrian was piqued.

"It does. You're being a _reallll_ cactus over here." Adrian still had a smile on his face and his arms were on his hips. She still gave him the cold shoulder- well, she was trying to be just as playful as him- but it was the cold shoulder regardless. "Fine then. We'll continue."

"Bruh, unpause the game." James gave Adrian a look. "I was in the middle of jumping and I don't wanna die."

"You're still going down regardless." Adrian sat back on his side of the couch and unpaused the game.

"Uhh, you'll second that." Zamasu threw a meteor towards Adrian which threw him off track and the producer fell off the screen leaving Zamasu victorious.

Adrian's mouth parted. "Oh fucking hell, alright. I'll give you that one. I'll give you that."

"You guysssss."

"Guess whooo…"

Both Jay and Lexi had walked downstairs, freshly showered and wearing clean clothes. The guys greeted them as well as paused their game because Speedrunners gets serious. Jay's attire was as simple as his trademark samurai bun; navy blue joggers and a fitted black roundneck shirt. Lexi was wearing a bell sleeve bodysuit which was a burgundy red color and Zamasu didn't realize that he also had a tiny thing for women like her in bodysuits, _we won't talk about that_. The bodysuit itself only looked like a sweater because the bottom portion of her suit was covered by her black…

Fucking…

 _Jeans._

Zamasu couldn't make this up. He wished he was lucky to be making this shit up. Why does this keep happening to him? Why does he keep matching with this damn woman, this strong, agile, pretty… _nice sounding_ … _stop it._ He had been playing a game with these three men having a good time (which he wouldn't admit out loud) and now he has to be pulled back into this _whirlpool of unknown insinuations_ again. It's like this is all done on purpose, how could she be wearing the same color jeans as him so casually, as if she hadn't seen the stupid jeans he has on at the moment.

Hopefully she won't actually vocalize the fact that their color jeans are matching. If she did, he'd probably explode into millions of pieces or something. Can Kaioshins do that? That'd be so handy at the moment.

Her jeans fit her curvy body very well. Zamasu also was wondering why he was paying attention to that at the moment.

"Lexi!" It was as if a switch was flipped on in Rebecca because she upped and went over to hug her female friend with a giant smile on her face. The three competitive males on the couch all exchanged looks at one another as the females hugged. Jay raised a brow at his girlfriend and she frowned at him.

"So," but the samurai bunned producer turned back to his guy friends and Zamasu, "What did I miss?"

"This close-ass match between me and these newbies." Adrian pointed with his thumb towards Zamasu and James.

" _This one_ is not a newbie, first of all." James pointed to himself and Zamasu even chimed in.

"Two 'newbies' that happened to be tied with you at the moment." The Kaioshin was referring to the scoreboard. It now read 2-2-2, which meant that the next victor would be the winner of the entire match.

"Really?! Zamasu, you've played this before?" Jay looked at the Kaioshin.

"This is my first time."

"How the fuck did you get even with these two?" He walked over to the side where Adrian was sitting. His spot became the cross-sectional portion of the sofa, next to Rebecca. "Nah, I gotta watch this. This is a close match. Hun, come here."

Lexi was more than intrigued to see how this would turn out. She saw the big space between James and Zamasu and went around the back of sofa to sit in between the men.

You would expect Zamasu to freeze and look over slowly to see this woman sit next to him, because there were no other seats available, but he didn't do all that. Instead he sat calmly, nonchalantly, as if she was some regular woman sitting next to him which she is at the end of the day. But his brain was doing all types of somersaults like it always does, except _twenty times worse_. The reason for this; she was sitting right beside him, and when she sat down he felt her leg make contact with his.

How was he supposed to focus now? And why does she smell so good again?

"Alright we're starting. Imma unpause it, you two ready?"

"Yup." James nodded. Zamasu took some time to answer.

"I'm ready." _No you're not._ Okay, he was really, but he's not at the same time. That makes sense, right?

Adrian unpaused the game and the three were back at it with their parkour moves and jumps. At this point, the trio were now completely on the offense; James would throw meteors, Adrian would close doors on them, and Zamasu would latch onto the others, they did these actions interchangeably.

"I like the Velociraptor. It looks so cute." Lexi leaned in a bit more. The Velociraptor in this game is green, and Zamasu happens to have green skin, so therefore does that mean that she was alluding to him being cute?

You see how _bad_ overthinking is when you don't know how to stifle it? Here he is pulling meanings out of his nose because this woman is so pretty. It's all her fault, everything that he's done and said is all her fault but he can't get angry, because she _friggin' pretty_. It's just not fair.

Luckily enough, Zamasu didn't die first, James did, and everyone's 'aww's resounded through the living room. Now he focused in on the remaining opposition; _Adrian_. The two were so focused that they didn't even speak, and everyone else could see and feel that from them.

"Oh shit…" Jay and James were both as focused as the other men. Even Lexi, who's had her fair share in gaming, was focused. Both the Velociraptor and the Flamenco were moving extraordinarily fast and both were viciously attacking and one-upping each other in order to win. At some point, the Velociraptor lost its footing and the entire living room went silent after a momentary uproar before finally, the screen got too small, and one individual remained.

The Flamenco stood victorious as the victory sound start playing.

"Dammit!" Zamasu exclaimed and dropped the controller down onto his lap.

"See? Ya can't touch me." Adrian placed his controller down on the coffee table and reclined back with both his hands resting against his head.

"Aww," Lexi pouted. "I wanted Zamasu to win, I'm getting tired of seeing you win this all the time."

Zamasu decided to chime in because he mirrored that sentiment. "Yes, _Adrian_!"

Even James added on. "Stop winning all the damn time, asshole."

"Look, you want it, you gotta _earn it_." Adrian shrugged. "But either way, it was a good game. Zamasu you did pretty dang good for your first try."

There was hand shaking between the three guys, which let them know that this battle was nothing short of camaraderie. Zamasu had inwardly decided that he had lost this battle, but he will _definitely_ come back for more.

"Okay, so now that that's been settled, you guys wanna go out?" Jay proposed an amazing plan because a) why not, and b) he was really hungry. The majority of the group agree except for Zamasu who asked why.

Lexi looked at the Kaioshin. "To get food." She answered in an obvious tone with a giggle at the end.

"Oh." That was his only response before he got up, which signified that he was down for whatever they'd do.

"There's six of us, and our cars could only fit four." Adrian crossed his arms in thought.

"I'll drive Lexi there." Rebecca opted, and she looked at her female friend. "Zamasu, I think you could go with the guys."

It's surprising to say that he was actually okay with the idea, because at least it gave him time to ask Jay the important questions he had. He nodded, and the guys gave each other daps because they would all be rolling together. Perhaps this entire day wouldn't be that bad, it wouldn't be as bad as the airport of course, because he wasn't dressed all weirdly and somewhat attractively, he looked just as normal as everyone else. And also, if Rebecca was driving Lexi, then that meant that he wouldn't have to see her face in a car with him. That's perfect!

Lexi gave her boyfriend a sweet kiss on the lips and turned back to Rebecca. Both of the women were chatting as they inadvertently walked out of the house, Lexi opening the door and waving at the other dudes and closing it finally. As soon as that happened, the three human guys exchanged looks.

"Y'all caught all that right?" Jay looked at the guys, and Adrian and James nodded.

"Yup. Just as I thought." The other producer walked towards the stairs. "Ima go get my shoes."

"I'll put mine back on." James went towards the front door to get his shoes, leaving Zamasu and Jay near the sofa.

"Did James or Adrian tell you to take off your shoes?" Jay asked the Kaioshin.

"James did." Zamasu answered. "Why?"

"Ugh, that's low." Jay shook his head and proceeded to explain before Zamasu could pop the obvious question. "I'd like for guests and stuff to keep their shoes off when they come into our house. It's a family thing that I've gotten used to and me and Adrian agreed on behalf of that rule. I dunno if you guys noticed, but she didn't take her shoes off."

Zamasu could very well understand and identify the stipulation behind those household rules. In the Kaishin realm, they stipulate heavily on rules around the houses and study halls. To have someone break those rules would be deemed a disrespect to whoever owned said premise, and since their world is very regal, it would be disrespectful to the Kaioshins themselves. How could he not notice that? Something as simple as that just showed a different perspective according to the doctor herself. That was something he also wanted to ask about, because now he's seeing that this was a little more complex compared to _'they_ simply just don't like me for what I did'.

"Wait, seriously?" James came back with his sneakers on. "I didn't even notice that."

"Yup, she did." Jay shook his head and looked to the side in irritation. He noticed that Zamasu was looking rather confused, not because of what she did now, but because of what he was _told_. "I think we need to kinda… explain to him…"

"I'm sure she's given him her side of the whole… thing." James rolled his eyes, and Zamasu turned to him.

"She told me that something that she did led to you all being upset at her." That was what she said, was it not? If it is true, then why did they give him funny looks after he said that?

"Oh no, it's _way_ more than just _something._ It's more than one thing that she did." James held his finger out for emphasis. At that moment, Adrian returned downstairs and immediately caught the drift between the others. He nodded to the door. "Aight. Let's go."

T±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±±T

"So are you three are just abstaining from her because she seems vile?"

"We aren't trying to ignore her at all." James looked back at Zamasu. He had decided to drive his car because he simply wanted to drive out to the place that Lexi had texted the address of when they got into the car. They didn't automatically start delving in on the subject of Rebecca, there were jokes and random subjects exchanged mostly by the human males and Zamasu was just there to chuckle, listen, and pitch in his two cents at what was said. Right now, they were cruising down the street at a steady pace.

"Then what took place for all of this to happen?"

"There are things that I dunno if I should spill, because you're living with her right now and I don't wanna mess things up with you and her."

This was a _whole new_ James that Zamasu was being introduced to. The Kaioshin didn't think that he was _that_ considerate. In fact, all three of the men didn't want to disclose her simply because he was still living with her. And also, Adrian had a earful of what Irene had gone through the last month. He knew this guy back then was super judgemental, but the producer reckoned that he changed a little bit. The only person who kind of backed up from the idea was Jay because even though he didn't want things to be awkward between Zamasu and Rebecca, he could easily see that the Kaioshin has got the wrong image of all three of them just from her.

"I can handle it." Zamasu crossed his arms. "If I've seen human civilizations fall and rise and fall again in bloody wars, then I can handle whatever she has done."

James pursed his lips, and made a noise. "That's… really depressing."

"Well geez."

Adrian shook his head. "My whole mood just depleted with that one statement."

"Well, _my apologies._ " Zamasu raised his hands. "This simple tension means nothing to me. I wouldn't be affected by it."

"Okay, so look…" Jay held his hands out together. "Rebecca's… a woman of many incidents, to put it _nicely_ \- well fuck that, I'm not sugarcoating shit." Jay waved his hand and continued. "Us three have been in drama that she had started before. She used to date Adrian way back, like highschool years. I dunno if she somehow told you that."

Zamasu nodded, so his first indicative inference was answered. "She didn't, but I saw pictures of you two when you were younger and I assumed that you two were in some sort of relationship."

"She still has those pictures?" Adrian's frown literally screamed 'Why the heck does she have them' to the Kaioshin. He looked back and nodded.

"Alright, so ever since then and when she had finally relocated with the rest of us, she started doing shitty things to us three. For Adrian, it was her sleeping with a lot of his friends to piss him off, including James. Mind you, this is like a good… couple dozen people." He stopped seeing the confused look on Zamasu's face. "What?"

"What's wrong with sleeping with people?"

The Kaioshin had nowhere near a dirty mind, so Adrian had to clarify it. "She was having sex with my friends to piss me off."

Zamasu blinked, a tinge of disgust overcame his features for half a second. He looked down and to the left, and then back at Adrian. "How would that piss you off?"

Adrian let out a tiny chuckle. " _It didn't_ , but it was annoying. She kept trying to get close with everyone, that includes sex, to get details on what my life was like. That's why she was friends with Jay's ex."

Jay made an audible 'ugh' sound and rubbed his forehead. "I don't even wanna- _ooooh_." He balled his fists up and shook his head, reminiscing what had taken place a couple years ago.

"I'll explain before you ki blast this car." Adrian held his friend's arm and Jay shook his head.

"Bruh, I'm too well controlled for that. But go on, say it."

"Alright. So Jay had a girlfriend before Lexi, right." Adrian made eye contact with the Kaioshin. "Rebecca became friends with her, and started asking her about Jay and things like that. I dunno what happened between the two for her to even think this up, but when they had broken up Rebecca helped her in trying to get Jay's banking information, which is _fucking illegal._ "

"Wait, real quick plugin," Jay raised a finger, "I didn't speak with her or nothing before and after this occurred. I technically didn't know the bitch back then and I didn't know that she had keep contact with my ex."

"Exactly." Adrian nodded. "So, not only did she help his ex get back at him by taking most of the money in his bank account and rendering him near _broke_ , but Rebecca covered all of _her_ tracks to keep herself scott free while Jay's ex went to jail."

Zamasu lowered his gaze in thought. He could _never ever_ see this woman do something like that, ever. But this was the past. "And all of this, all of what she done was because… of something that took place years ago?"

"Mm-hmm. It makes no sense, to be real with you." Jay shook his head.

"Is that why you live with Adrian?"

"Jay's got enough money to make a house twice as big as mine. He just doesn't wanna move out because he'll miss me." Adrian spilled the shameless plug which made Jay hit his forearm.

"I'm not moving out because I like that place. It has nothing to do with you."

" _Riiight,_ so if you got your place and decorated it to look just like our right now, you wouldn't miss me?"

"That's besides the point." Jay waved off his question. "I just like where I live right now. And I'm definitely not leaving that dojo we bought."

"Uh-huh." Adrian turned to Zamasu. "He just won't admit it." Another hit to his wrist now and Adrian shrugged. "You can hit me all you want. I still stand correct."

Jay had a cross look on his face. "I'm getting your ass later."

"Woah, Jay don't you have a girlfriend?" James, being the witty asshole he is, chimed in with the wrong question at the right time.

"THAT-THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT- you sacks of shit." He shook his head when the two of them started laughing. Zamasu watched this; between the lowkey married couple-esque duo in the back and the basketball player in the front, he had to say that this dynamic was more amusing than he had initially thought. " _ANYWAYS_ \- can you two dimwits stop laughing like idiots?"

"Okay, okay, we'll be seriously now." Adrian took a deep breath.

"Did you guys mention that our 'ignorance' of her is not on our behalf?" James looked into the car mirror for the second. They reached a stoplight and James took his hands off the steering wheel. "She deliberately does not talk to us. You've seen that Zamasu, she just wouldn't talk to us even if we're all laughing and having fun."

"Bruh she didn't even smile or anything." Adrian said, and Zamasu could very well agree with that statement. The second she had stepped into his house he had noticed these strange things about her. From how she always seemed to be, he thought that she'd try to talk her way into whatever the guys were saying. Instead, she did the exact opposite, and lowkey disrespected Jay and Adrian's household as well.

"She had her shoes on in your house too. Just directly spat in the face of you two." Jay's culture, to be more exact. Zamasu shook his head, that action alone is saying a lot about her.

"Did you tell her to take them shits off?" Adrian asked.

"Dude, I _clearly_ said 'Take your shoes off'. Right, Zamasu? He heard me and did that, no challenge."

"You did say that." Zamasu was replying while looking at the car floor in thought. He had noticed the glaring aspect about her too. She did the same thing to Adrian when he, the person she seemed to have the most problems with, was trying to get her to be a little lighter. She just shrugged him and his attempts off completely. "This makes no sense."

"What makes no sense?" Jay had to lean to the side to get a view of the back of Zamasu's head.

"She doesn't act like that in front of me. She's looks nice."

"Alright," Jay voiced the question that Zamasu would have no problem explaining. "Have you ever sat close with her? Like actually done something platonic and intimate with her like hugging or something?"

"Wait woah, _Zamasu? Hugging?"_ Adrian raised his brows.

"I did do that once."

"Well shit, I don't know much about you then." Adrian shook his head. "Did she ignore you afterwards?"

"Yes."

"See." Jay gestured towards him. "That's where it lies. You give her the attention she craves and once she gets it, she dishes you off and leaves you feeling stupid as fuck thinking shit wasn't one-sided."

That's actually a better way to word it for the Kaioshin. Minus the cursing but, it was still more coherent and better thought-out. "She was simply upset, and the only thing I could do to keep her from being that way was to hold her until she slept. I had no emotion for it either."

"That makes sense though." James nodded. "I'd do that myself if someone else was looking super upset."

"Like to the point where it rubs off on you." Adrian spoke the words right before Zamasu was about to say them. Why does it keep happening? Why did thing happen simultaneously all the sudden? Has it always been like this?

"It _was_ , and that's why I did it. I didn't think she'd become impetuous the day after."

"That's what she does. She doesn't know how to accept good things because she's too busy avoiding everything else. She's non-confrontational, that's all it is." Jay could read a person like a book, and Zamasu commended him for that gift. All three of these men were much more intuitive than he thought, and the only reason Zamasu didn't come to these conclusions quicker was because of the metaphorical brick wall that blocked him from fully understanding human thought. And because he didn't know how to word them, which was in conjunction with the first reason.

It's funny because before he didn't like Jay for looking like he mastered the uses of façades, and seemed somewhat fake. Now, the man was starting to grow on him.

That was another thing he wanted to bring up. Zamasu went back into his memory banks to make sure he wasn't mistaking something. He turned around to look at Jay. "Does she have something against you?"

"I dunno about that. You might wanna ask her-"

"Actually don't. You'll waste your time, because she'll twist and turn the conversation so that she wouldn't have to answer your question." James snapped his fingers when some prick in an neon orange Jeep peeled into his lane outta nowhere. Who the hell drives a _neon orange Jeep?_ "Shit, asshole done cut me off…"

"Why'd you ask?" Jay leaned forward.

"She was staring at you earlier, while we were playing that game. And yesterday when Lexi came," he took a moment to relish the sound of her damn name, "She asked how you were doing specifically."

"Oh shit, don't _tell me_ she's trying to reenact shit with Lexi." Adrian looked really pissed.

Jay kissed his lips at the silly thought. "Bruh you know Lexi already. If Rebecca tries something, she'll put her in her place."

"...true, true. I just don't want that shit to happen again."

"It sucks, really." James shook his head. "The type of shit people do for attention."

Jay groaned. "Not even that, rather the shit people do when they're desperate for acceptance. We can't be buddy-buddy if she doesn't choose to change the way she is for _good_."

"Yeah..." James said, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. "I wanna move on from this subject, because it's irritating." That made the other two chuckle, even Zamasu sort of agreed with James.

"Eh," Adrian shrugged. "It'll pass."

"Yeah, it's really nothing at the end of day. We won't pull our noses through a straw over this." Jay pulled out his phone. He scrolled through a couple things like some messages he got from other producers and the close friends in his immediate circle. "Bruh, James, do you know where we're going?"

"I'm driving there right now." James belabored, glancing back at Jay.

Jay nodded. "Just making sure."

"Where _are_ we going, by the way?" Zamasu was quick to move on from the topic that he had started.

"We're gonna go to _Loguini_." Adrian made that Italian spice gesture as he said that. "Basically the best pizzeria there is."

"A pizzeria?" Zamasu frowned.

"Yeah, it's a place that sells pizza." Jay explained. "It's so freaking delicious…" He was already thinking about what he was gonna order, he was really really hungry and he's pretty sure the guys could share that same sentiment. Well, almost all of them.

"What is a pizza?"

The guys collectively went exclaimed at Zamasu's question.

"You don't know what _pizza_ is?!" Jay looked at him utterly surprised, because one of the first things a person is introduced to is pizza. You don't even need to be living on Earth for more than a year to know pizza even _is_.

"What the fuck? Are you serious?" James furrowed his brows.

"I dunno what either Rebecca and Irene have been doing _not_ making you try pizza for God's sake." Adrian shook his head, and Zamasu shot him a look at the word 'God'. Adrian blinked, but then sighed when he understood the look. "For _fucks_ sake, excuse my language."

Jay snorted. "It's a good thing I picked Loguini because you'll be exposed to some _five star_ pizza." He looked up from his phone. "You're gonna love it, trust me."

"It's gonna suck after he tries that." James shook his head with a smirk. "If Irene were to order pizza from somewhere else, it wouldn't have the same pizzazz as Loguini's."

"Right? He'll get pizza from somewhere else and be like 'the fuck is this shit'?" Adrian and Jay laughed and Zamasu just shook his head with the ghost of a smile on his face.

"Setting the standard is more important. He deserves it, it's Godly pizza." Jay shot the same look that Zamasu shot him. "Yeah I said it. Watch, you'll be agreeing with me once you try it."

" _Right_." Zamasu didn't agree with him at first because of his sarcastic behavior. The Kaioshin crossed his arms and shook his head while inaudibly chuckling. He didn't know nor did he consciously feel it, but he was opening up to others much faster than he had anticipated. Not only that, but these three men would end up revealing experiences that he never thought he'd get himself into. At least, not if he acted the same way he did when he was with Irene, but things weren't just getting funnier…

They are getting more and more _intrinsically stupid._

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 **St. James Ballroom is an actual song by Alice Francis and the other song was On and On by Erykah Badu; in this fanfic a male is singing both of them because it's a different universe xD. I'm sorry if I spoiled those songs for you if you were trying to guess what they sounded like or something, I dunno.** **You've seen't the other side of what went down between the guys and Rebecca. Zamasu has only gotten a taste of Rebecca's reasoning and she refused to make it sound like she was putting blame on them, but also keeping it off of her. Shit just gets juicier...**

 **Rebecca will be learning to how fight from Zamasu, we'll see if her motives actually stick true to what they should be for obvious reasons. Lol, a pupil having a pupil, ain't this something :). I also named this chapter the way it was for a reason, and you'll find that with the amount of... well, _synchronicity_ between the Kaioshin and the humans. It's becoming more and more noticeable along with his growing awareness. **

**And by the way I hope none of you have been on iFunny when the Italian memes were running amok. I didn't even realize the name of the pizzeria was the same name from the Italian meme variant of 'Logan'. I won't apologize.**


	20. Blazing Common Ground

**There are no warnings in this chapter, I already stated it in the previous one. So uh… read at your own risk. (there's no risk involved, I'm just fucking with you)**

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 **Blazing Common Ground**

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Is it not fair to say that the car ride to Loguini's was something that anyone would find cherishable? They went from talking about past issues, shitty puns, the match between the God and the men, humanity after seeing a stupid video, to arguing about what type of chocolate is the best. Apparently, aside from Zamasu finding out that these guys weren't so _proud_ of the things their race did, he found out that James liked white chocolate. Zamasu had tasted white chocolate from that box Lexi gave him and he honestly found that type of chocolate to be too overly sweet, like to the point where it was stupid.

To put it in Jay's words, it's like _diabetes in one bite_.

"I don't care what any of you guys say." Adrian waved off the others with a flick of his wrist. "Milk chocolate will always be the _best_ chocolate out there, hands down."

"Dark chocolate tastes amazing though." Jay held out a finger. "Dark chocolate wins over anything."

"Bro, dark chocolate tastes nasty." James shook his head. "It's not even sweet."

Both Zamasu and Jay looked super offended at James' aversion, and unintentionally said the same sentence simultaneously. " _What is wrong with you?"_

"He probably had the ones that are like 90 percent cocoa." Adrian was reaching for bridges between the opinions. " _Those_ tastes nothing like chocolate."

"They're just bars of cocoa at that point, and cocoa is mad bitter." Jay said. "Ever heard of Lidnt?"

" _Tastes like dirt._ " James made a sound. "Like even the 80 percent ones are painful to eat."

"Why would they make something that tastes that bad then?" Zamasu asked, raising his brow.

"To make people suffer." Jay answered simply.

The basketball player peeled into the driveway of Loguini. "Because good chocolate is too much, so they need shitty chocolate to balance it out." Anything in this world could be analogous to what James had said.

"It's like good people and shitty people. You may hate either one but you need both just to balance shit out." Adrian added on, already making an analogy to the reason behind the existence of both good and bad chocolate.

"Balance?" Zamasu frowned. "Then why do more horrible humans exist? That doesn't seem balanced at all, doesn't it?"

Jay looked at Zamasu. "I think it's a close margin now. It's not like the bad guys _outnumber_ the good ones, because then _everyone_ would be dead."

"I agree." James said. "But the thing is, both bad and good intentions technically don't need a bunch of people pitching in for an effect. You could have two people running around blowing up the Earth and killing every human in sight. They don't need to outnumber everyone else."

"If that's the case, then it's based on sheer power or influence." Adrian leaned forward. "If either side has a lot of influence, then that's what's gonna be flowing through the population and stuff. As far as I know and what it looks like right now, it's close to even game."

"We got good things, and we got bad things. We need good things to determine what's bad, and vice versa. Otherwise, the world would just be boring." Jay shrugged.

That statement made everyone in the car give Jay a look. Adrian tilted his head. "Boring?"

"I mean that not everyone needs to be good nor do we all need to be bad, that's not how life works, we're not supposed to live and do the exact same thing. I didn't mean not having crime or other shit to be boring." The guys agreed, Zamasu slowly nodding as he heard the words coming from these guys' mouth.

But the Kaioshin was more emotionally invested into the concept of good/bad compared to Jay, who only said what he said with a plain shrug. "What justice does that do for those who are good?"

"Hmmm…" Adrian scratched his chin. "What kind of justice? Like, you can put them in jail or you can do something drastic like killing them, justice is kind of subjective."

"Exactly, like one person could think bringing justice means, like Adrian said, sending someone to prison, another could think deportation brings justice, and someone else could think death of a person brings justice." Jay added on. At this point they were all facing one another. "I dunno how to explain it, but justice could mean different things to different people."

"I wanna say that's why both good and bad exist." James said, articulating slightly as he spoke. Zamasu looked at him. "Like, justice needs the both of them in order to be defined. If everything is only good or only bad, then what is justice anyway? You need both to define what justice is, I can't word this in a better way bruh."

"Nah, you said it well." Adrian snapped his fingers. "That definition is different based on the person too, it's still justice nonetheless."

"Then again, if you kill someone because they did something bad, that's a _life_ that was taken." Jay said. "Even if they have committed horrible crimes against humanity, like mass genocide or something crazy. But for petty crimes compared to that, execution would be kinda ridiculous."

"Like you rob a bank, and then you get decapitated. We've grown far past that shit." Adrian snorted.

James pointed. "Dude remember in the history books, when back then if you stole bread from a local store of some shit, you'd get killed? That was centuries ago, and now we've only get to imprison those people, mainly because we kinda _know_ that a person is a _person_ , and they're not just expendable."

Zamasu was just quietly listening. When he first saw Adrian and Jay at Irene's house, they greeted him and then just started speaking to one another about things that did not concern him. He thought they were annoying and very rash, so he ignored whatever they were saying and just went upstairs. That whole time, he hadn't tried to interject or say a word because he felt what they were saying was stupid. _Now,_ sitting in an expensive well-conditioned car, Zamasu wasn't staying quiet because he wasn't considering what they were saying. He was staying quiet because of _what_ they were saying, because in his head he was thinking that these are mere humans explaining and talking more about justice than he had heard from his own species. In the Kaishin realm, it seemed like some unwritten rule to not address what seemed, to Zamasu, to be a glaring problem in the universes they have created.

It wasn't an unwritten rule. It was because the Kais and the Kaioshin have come to accept the existence of good and bad and have removed the emotional attachment to either alignment. Zamasu didn't know any of that.

"But what does that say humanity?" Adrian popped a question. "I'm bringing it back to Zamasu's question, because now that I thought about it… We are _way fucking better off_ in the recent years. Like, we went from doing shitty things out of spite and having a lack of responsibility to all of this. Instead of killing criminals left and right, we have procedures and shit in order to deal with them." He held his hands up. "I'm not saying that crimes aren't being prosecuted, don't get me wrong, but I guess we've become more uhh…" Both James and Adrian said the same word simultaneously in agreement. "Reasonable."

Zamasu was thinking, he was thinking on behalf of what Adrian had said. It made _sense_ , even if they couldn't find the right words to condense what they had said, but these were the most _intelligent_ things he had heard out of a human's' mouth so far. And they came from the same people he had thought would never have thoughts crossing in their minds like that. It was as if they, like him, were once questioning the ideas, the concepts, the reasons why not everything was just good. But they had different things in mind, different views that weren't like his.

But they intrigued him. Their explanations made him _curious_.

So he asked another question to get their gears turning more than they are now. "By that logic, then what _is_ good?"

There was no hitch in their speech. James spoke up first. "Doesn't that like… change?"

Adrian nodded. "Yeah, I think it changes along with the era or something we're in. Like now, killing a bunch of people is deemed wrong by most people, but back then it could be justified with something else, like it being a duty, or religion."

" _Nothing_ could justify taking the life of a person." Jay shook his head. "Regardless of who they are. Like- okay," he held his hands out, "I might sound sappy or cheesy right now, but killing another person will not ultimately solve all problems. Like… war for example; using war to end war is just retarded."

James nodded. "Exactly- I was just about to say that too! You can't use the same shit to end _that_ shit."

"Quick plug-in." Adrian raised a hand. "Y'all remember biology? Zamasu I think you might know this."

"Yes." Zamasu paid full attention to the producer.

"I do." James and Jay nodded.

"You guys know and remember positive and negative feedback?" Adrian threw a pointed finger down for emphasis. "This is _just like_ what we're talking about."

"Oh… _oh._ " Zamasu looked down and back at him. "You're actually _right_." The Kaioshin was familiar with many studies and such, so knowing about this was pretty much second nature to him. "So it goes with war, using the same tactic to get the opposite reaction just doesn't make sense."

"It really doesn't." James was looking down at his phone for a second, but he placed it back into his pocket.

"Then why do mortals fight one another, if it doesn't make sense?"

The guys looked between each other and shrugged, but then James abruptly ended his midway. "Oh, maybe it's because they don't understand that…"

"That, and because of emotion." Jay answered simply.

Adrian added on, finding the right dialogue that worded his thoughts perfectly. "Right, because think about it. When you're super emotional about something no matter who you are, all logic just seems to fly out your brain and you just act out on those emotions."

"Yup, that is true." James and Jay vocally agreed.

"Is that why in those war movies, those fighting always seem to be so… invested in what they're fighting for?" Zamasu asked.

"I mean, movies are kinda fictional, but yup, you're on the right track." Adrian nodded to him.

James smiled. "That's why I like those movies, not because of the psychology behind that shit."

Jay sat up in excitement. "You got those guys who are so patriotic over their 'cause', and the guys who just go in for the thrill of killing because they don't know any better, and then you have the guys that don't know where they fuck they are. Those type of movies are so interesting."

"They may be boring to most people, but analyzing the setting and what they say and that whole rhetoric of 'fighting for peace' is just like bread and butter to me. I fucks heavy with those deep movies." Adrian smiled.

Zamasu blinked and leaned forward, finding common ground. "You guys like analyzing movies too?"

"Dude, hell yes!"

Jay agreed. "If it's a good movie or a good book, you best believe I'm looking deep into that shit."

"You guys can I just say, I fucking love how our conversations turn out." James' gratitude made the guys laugh. "We're like 'milk chocolate beats all chocolate and dark chocolate tastes like shit' and now we are sitting in a circle like… _what is justice? What is good and bad?"_

"Exactly!" Jay and Adrian laughed out loud, and Zamasu shared a chuckle with the three. The Kaioshin looked down at the car floor with a smirk on his face, there was a weird budding feeling within him that he couldn't, and _shouldn't_ , shake off. It was rare, it was small, very _miniscule_ in fact. It definitely felt unfamiliar, but it wasn't something he shook off immediately. He let it linger, and it didn't grow any further because he didn't comprehend it.

"Oh shit, I didn't even realized that we were here already." Adrian looked past James and Zamasu and out the front window, Loguini was right in front of them. The pizzeria had red outlines and accents around its outer walls, along with white and a tinge of orange.

"Yeah, I parked like several minutes ago but I forgot to tell you guys because of our deep talk." James sheepishly chuckled.

The four males exited the car, and walked towards Loguini. Jay frowned. "How come they didn't come out while we were just sitting in the car? Are they even in there-oh there they are." They could see through the clean windows of the pizzeria. Lexi and Rebecca were sitting in a larger booth meant for groups and it looked like they were both talking.

"They're in a serious looking chat." Adrian noticed how the two didn't seem to be bothered by looking outside. Whether they noticed the guys or not was up to them.

"What if they were talking about what we were talking about?" Zamasu asked with a slight chuckle at the entertaining thought.

"Oh boy, then it's a fucking feast." That made Zamasu unexpectedly cackle for a short second, which made the other guys laugh along with him. They entered Loguini with cooled down smiles on their faces after the Kaioshin's sudden cackle. Jay was the first to wave at the women who looked up when they entered the pizzeria.

"Jay!" Lexi stood up to cordially hug her boyfriend, and the guys gave their greetings to the women and some of the staff that were walk around, as they did know them.

"Rebecca." Zamasu pretended quite well that he wasn't exposed to some tea that she didn't tell him. And tea was the correct word to use, as the guys did tell him that the phrase 'spilling tea' meant to 'tell a secret' or something that isn't known by others. She turned to him to in her seat. "Hello."

"Hi, Zamasu!" Rebecca stood up and hugged him despite him not being cool with human contact… unless if you just happened to be Lexi of course. We won't talk about that. "How come you guys took a longer time to get here?"

"We were talking about stuff." Adrian wasn't lying, they really were, although not all information must be given to others. The Kaioshin saw that these men knew this very well.

"Well, must've been important, like the match that went on between these three." Lexi leisurely pointed to said men who were playing games earlier. She looked at Zamasu, particularly his attire. "Where'd you get that gi from?"

Oh _by the heavens and all things above,_ she even knew what a _gi_ was! Zamasu could have inwardly celebrated at the fact that not only was she pretty, but she was smart. "I've had this ever since I came here. It's from my mentor."

"Wow, really? It's looks _clean_." Lexi's compliment somehow made something in the Kaioshin _light up_ , in a sense. He didn't know why those simple two sentences lifted his whole mood up. We're still not going to talk about it.

"Isn't that the gi you wear underneath your uhh… armor thing?" Jay asked. "It goes so well with your black jeans."

"That was his choice, by the way. Not mine." Rebecca added in with a smile on her face looking at Zamasu.

Jay also smiled only at Zamasu. "I can see that. I dig."

"Well, Jay's the fashionista out of all of us, even if he's wearing basic shit." Adrian went to sit down on the booth. The booths were red with button tufted backs and the tables were white with black particles in them. The producer sat across from where Rebecca was. "So if he's complimenting you that's a plus on your part."

"Shush, Adrian." His fellow producer gave him a playful slap on his arm as he scooted him over to sit next to him.

"That was my seat, ya know." Lexi raised her finger.

Both of the males looked at her and simultaneously spoke. "Oh."

Lexi kissed her teeth, and went to sit next to Rebecca. She didn't do it to stir something in her boyfriend because of the person she was sitting with, there was no underhanded intention behind her choice. James looked at Zamasu and went over to sit next to Lexi. The Kaioshin, at first, did not know why James looked at him, but now that the man had chosen his seat he understood completely… and was kind of thankful for it.

"Did you guys order yet?" James looked at the two women beside him.

Lexi nodded. "Yeah, I got four boxes, two of them being cheese, one supreme, and one with pepperoni. You guys gotta go and get your drinks."

"I'm right here." One of the waiters came by. "The ladies ordered earlier. What wou-" He stopped when he saw this one green guy with pointy ears sitting with a bunch of rich, famous people. The waiter looked at Jay, because the guy knew him best, while pointing between the group and Zamasu. "Uhh…"

"Friend." Was all he said.

"Alright." Was the reply he gotten with a deep nod. "What would you fellas like to drink?"

"Hmm…" Adrian scratched his chin like Jigsaw Jones or something, making the guys look at him. "I'm in the mood for some green tea right now."

Jay and James immediately caught whiff of his choice, and they decided why not choose the same thing? You know, because tea _tastes good._ "Yeah, me too. Definitely would like tea at the moment." Jay looked at James. "What about you, James?"

"You know what, I might just have some green tea as well." The basketball player smirked along with the three and they looked at Zamasu.

Adrian asked Zamasu. "What about you, Zamasu?"

"Hmm?" Zamasu had _just_ realized; their wordplay was impeccable, the Kaioshin had realized what they were hinting at. Why not join in on the wits as well? "Why yes. I'd like some tea too."

"Hot or cold?" The waiter asked.

" _The best tea is always served hot_." Zamasu couldn't keep the smirk off his face as he can _feel_ the sniggers from the other guys. "Mine will be hot."

"Mine too."

"Me too."

"I side with that. I'll have hot tea." Adrian nodded.

"Alrighty, four hot green teas. They will be ready in a few minutes." The waiter walked away, leaving the four guys to smirk at one another.

"...What was that all about?" Rebecca looked between the mischievous men with a smile.

"We just want some tea." Jay looked at his girlfriend. "It's nothing, really."

James was quick to change the subject subtly before the women could get more suspicious. "I just thought about something. You guys are gonna be busy over the week, right? Because I got a game to prepare for."

"Well yeah, I got music to make _boy._ " Adrian leaned forward to give him a look.

"And I have a runway to dominate." Lexi sipped the glass of flavored water she ordered.

"Oh yeah, I forgot about that!" Jay exclaimed, and Lexi gave him a cross look.

"I told you this like two days ago. How could you forget?"

"Uhh…" He scratched the back of his head. "Ow- why'd you kick my knee?"

"You don't just forget what your girlfriend is going to do in a few days."

" _Yeah Jay._ " Adrian being the dickheaded-loving friend he is chimed in with Lexi.

"You're such a bad boyfriend." James shook his head with a 'tsk tsk'. Jay frowned at him with a smirk on face, knowing these two were just fucking with him. "Lexi needs someone more loyal. Someone that won't forget shit, like Zamasu or something."

James did not know that anything involving Lexi to the kaioshin would made a bunch of formulas run through his head trying to figure why the heck he would act so weird around her. Zamasu literally sat straight up and no one paid much attention to it because they thought he did after hearing his own name. But _no_ , he was doing that because of that _whole sentence,_ and James literally was just joking around about Zamasu being Lexi's significant other. But due to Zamasu's well versed imagination, he could only internally yell at the idea.

But we are _still_ not going to talk about it.

"James, you're such an idiot." Jay shook his head. "Zamasu doesn't like human women first of all."

"Bruh, why are you taking it seriously?" adrian gently punched Jay's arm.

"Bitch, this is my girl we're talking about here!" He crossed his arms and humphed.

Lexi giggled at her boyfriend's sulky face, but she decided to push him over the edge just a little tiny bit. The model looked at Zamasu who was _quiet as fuck_ during this and smirked back at Jay. "I wouldn't mind it."

Alright that's it. We're gonna talk about it now.

You ever seen those videos where there's nukes going off? Well take those and add a giant tsunami going over the explosions along with a bunch of thunderstorms and simultaneous lightning strikes. That's what's going on in Zamasu's head right now.

The Kaioshin shot a look at Lexi by accident, because his cheeks were slowly getting a little above their normal temperature, and then he pretended to scoff and shake his head. _WHY… WOULD SHE JUST CASUALLY SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT_? Yes, that was his thought, he literally yelled that in his head. This pretty woman has _no idea_ how much he mentally suffers around her stupid, pretty floral-scented presence. Does she not know how horrible he was feeling right now all due to some stupid instinct that's been kicking in him ever since he had sat next to her at the stupid airport? Never mind the fact that he was overusing the word stupid in his thoughts because that's exactly what this and his behavior is… just _stupid._ And she has the nerve to entertain such an intimate thought that he could never conjure up himself, does she not know that?

 _ **Why don't you just tell her that then-**_ _NO._ You know why? You wanna know why he wouldn't tell her that? You really, really _really_ want to know?

Because he can't. And you wanna know why he can't?

Because she's pretty. It makes perfect sense.

"Lexi, c'mon now. Don't give him ideas."

And Rebecca had the absolute… _nerve_ , to just escalate things further. He internally groaned very loud because now his good vibes were all gone. Now they were just… confused, and annoyed and stupid vibes.

"I'm sure he's not bothered by it, right Zamasu?" The Kaioshin looked nonchalant and normal on the outside. "See, besides he doesn't like human women."

There was a fleeting moment of him wanting to prove her wrong for some odd reason, and that reason was because she is human and humans are always wrong- you know what, I think it's time to not talk about this any further before all of our brains start hurting at this _outstanding_ logic.

The tea actually came by a minute before the pizza did. Great, it was good scapegoat from all the embarrassment he just felt. Not because of them, but because of… his thoughts. He looked into it realizing that he had never had another being, human or not, make tea for him. He was always making his own tea. He took a sip and wasn't disappointed. It wasn't as _good_ as his own, but it wasn't bad either, and it wasn't bland. He approved of it.

"This tea tastes great dude." Adrian was nodding in approval as he sipped.

"Don't spill it." James said giving Adrian that _look_ again, and his friend returned the look as well.

"You two. You guys are idiots." Jay chuckled, purposely keeping this exchange elusive so that the two women were left guessing. Finally, the four trays of pizza, two each being held by a waiter, were approaching the group. They placed the circle trays on the table lined up after one another and Zamasu watched as each tray was placed on the table with a frown. The last waiter came by with six plates, and placed them down as well for James and Zamasu to pass down to the others.

"What's wrong, Zamasu?" Adrian looked at him.

"I don't get it." The Kaioshin looked at the three varieties of pizza. "Is it like… some giant pancake with cheese on it? This seems really simplistic."

"Please don't tell me he never tried pizza before." Lexi shook her head in astonishment.

" _He hasn't_." The three men shared the same sentiment.

Jay leaned over to look at Zamasu. "Dude, try it. I swear it's bomb." So Zamasu picked one up while everyone else did. His was the simple one, a plain cheese slice. He blinked at it, wondering how this simple flat thing was supposed to be really tasty, and finally took a bite.

Remember the aforementioned myriad of nukes? Now just take those and Zamasu's face and put the Shooting Stars song in with him cruising through the universe because _Sweet Kami_ he did not expect this to be so… heavenly. How could this simple mix of bread, cheese and tomatoes taste like God's ultimate creation? This was made by mere _humans_?

Zamasu came back to inquiring, and he slowly turned to Rebecca. "Rebecca."

His voice was so firm and serious that it made everyone turn to him. The doctor blinked. "Yeah?"

"Have you been hiding this from me?"

"Huh?!" She frowned. "Oh, uhh-"

"The hell are you going _not_ showing him what pizza is?" Adrian looked at her. Zamasu shook his head.

"Look, while he was with me I wasn't thinking about pizza at all!" She tittered at Zamasu's facial expression.

"I fucking _tolllld you_ pizza tastes great." Jay raised his brow in an 'I told you so' manner.

"I never said you were wrong." Zamasu narrowed his eyes at Jay. To be fair, he actually never said that pizza would taste bad so… he wasn't wrong.

And Jay knew that. "Fair play, Kaioshin. Fair play."

And that was the cusp of the afternoon. The six individuals had spent time talking to one another as expected. Zamasu had learned a lot about the others because the topic of fighting had been brought up. Even though he favored the idea of him being alone with Jay when inquiring, he wouldn't have learned that Adrian also can fight and control his ki as well. He wouldn't have learned that Jay had been accustomed to karate since he was a child, which explains why he knew so much and why he was very good at fighting. He also wouldn't have been piqued to actually look at the footage of the last World Tournament, which was Adrian's recommendation despite Jay's humbleness. He offered to show Zamasu the video if he had the time to return back to his place.

He also didn't know that Lexi was a model. Well, he didn't _know_ the terminology for someone who struts on a stage until she had actually said it. She explained what it is that models do to him because he didn't know what they did. While she was a model, she also owned a clothing and a perfume line all under her name. He was pretty much surrounded by very famous people who actually don't seem as famous as they thought, mainly because they don't prance about in that same wealth they acquired. James was an exception, he does have a slight tinge of arrogance in him that is toned down whenever he's with these guys. For some reason, the only times Zamasu was faced with that more arrogant side of James… was when Irene was in their presence.

Was he going to make connections? Probably not, things like that were too vague at the moment, even the intuitive Kaioshin knew better than to string up conspiracies.

Sometime during their eating, the music producers had realized that they had ordered a little too much pizza, and literally sat there doing mental math to see how many slices each person could get. There were six people, and four pizzas with eight slices which meant thirty two slices in total. Five slices each happened to be a little too much, so the untouched tray of pizza was given to the waiters and waitresses. Like every restaurant Zamasu has been in so far, the place was cleared out. Lexi opted to pay for everyone, but Rebecca insisted that she'd pay instead, and so she did.

"Ooooooh, I am… super full." Lexi stretched and then stood up.

"Yeah, same." James stood up and everyone else was standing up as well. He cracked his knuckles. "I'ma have to go somewhere soon, meet up with my team and we're gonna formulate shit and stuff."

"Are you gonna be practicing? You _just_ ate, that's the recipe for killer cramps." Adrian looked at James.

"Oh no, no we're not gonna do a practice drill today. We're just gonna plan things out. It's the afternoon right now, anyways." He looked down at his phone after seeing a notification pop up. "So I'll drive you three back to Adri's place, and then I'm gonna bounce to the court."

Lexi looked at Rebecca, who was quiet once again. She gave her a kind look, but one that was inquisitive on behalf of her silence. Rebecca just shrugged. "What?"

"Remember what I told you." Lexi said it loud enough for only Rebecca to hear.

"Okay, okay. I'll remember it." She chuckled and looked downwards. "I kinda wanna bring him back home."

"Who?"

"You know who." She nodded towards Zamasu, who was actually communicating with the guys. "But I'm not gonna. I want him to enjoy himself, even though he'll deny he ever did."

Lexi laughed. "I'm not surprised." Rebecca had told her a bit about Zamasu, you know, because it's good to know things about other people. No, she did not tell her that Zamasu had a crush on her, but she did say that the Kaioshin was particularly quirky in a weird way. He had things about him that made him intelligent self look like an idiot, and Lexi said that that was best quality in any dude regardless. Little did she know, Rebecca was alluding to how Zamasu was staring at her and how he acted in her presence, you know, like an idiot would. Of course that would be the best thing about a dude, especially when they're hot and don't realize that they are.

"You mind driving me back with them?"

"Hmm?" Rebecca looked back at her, not registering her question at first because she was looking at the guys with her arms crossed. "Oh, yup, I will. But I wanna ask… don't you have a fashion show to get ready for?"

"Well, yeah." Lexi nodded. "In like five days. I won't have to fly out until a couple days from now. Why?"

Rebecca raised her brows. "Oh, I was thinking of driving you back to your house. To prepare for your flight."

"You just wanna talk to me more, don't you?" Lexi crossed her arms. "Don't you wanna go chime in with the guys? They won't try to admonish you."

" _Yeaaaah_ but… what can they even talk about? I highly doubt Zamasu even spoke or even listen to them while they were in the car." Rebecca shrugged.

Lexi gave her a look, and then she finally sighed. "Fine, you can drive me 'back'. I thought you were gonna stay around a bit longer, we haven't been out for long."

"Well…" She kept glancing back at the guys. "There's more things I need to explain to you."

Nevermind the fact that they had a considerable amount of time in the car and before the guys came. As a woman, for some reason it was difficult for her to get straight to the point with things without divulging into another subject, and that's partly because she was swerving around the decision to actually _tell someone_ that she might just be in a little bit of danger. Because you know… burdens aren't fun.

Not even that, she just doesn't like it when people get in her business. That's literally her strongest reason as to why she keeps quiet most of the time.

"Hey, _boys._ " Lexi had agreed to allotting Rebecca more time for 'girl-talk' in a sense, so she was rallying up the attention of the men. Despite their cross looks at the way she called them boys, she continued. "Me and Rebecca gotta do something. We'll meet you guys at wherever you decide to go next."

"You guys got something to talk about?" Jay went to his girlfriend's side, speaking loud enough so that she could only hear him. "Is it that confidential?"

Lexi smiled. "It's girl talk. Do you wanna join us?"

"Hell no." He chuckled. "Just… don't take too long."

"Alrighty, I'll see you around." She gave him a sweet hug, and turned to her female friend. "Rebecca, we can go now."

The other guys said their goodbyes, including Zamasu, because now he can breathe like a normal Kaioshin does. Well, not that he hasn't been breathing this whole time, it's just that he kind of… she's just... you get the damn point.

The women left, leaving the four men alone once again. Adrian looked at Jay, and Jay gave the other two males a look as well.

"Is it me or am I the only one who's _not_ full?" Jay asked, and Adrian gave him an agreeing look.

"Fam, I am not full either but I'd probably go for something a little lighter than pizza."

"Alrighty then, we'll make another stop to another food place in broad daylight." James tossed his keys up in the air and caught them.

"It's not like we've been trying to hide either." Adrian smirked. They really weren't, a bunch of celebrities and some green God of Creation riding around West City isn't a sight you'd particularly see every single day. James' car had black tinted windows because you wouldn't want someone running in the middle of the street towards your car to see you, and besides where they were going was some simple small sandwich shop. Like Loguini, it wasn't in the middle of the city, so the chance of exposure would be slim to none. Besides, most of their fans are cool people… _most_ of them.

The car ride, like the previous one, sparked random topics and subjects that the four males went into. They all are very aware as to how comfortable they were with one another, especially Jay. He didn't particularly like James, but as a person of respect, he wasn't going to spend his time giving him dirty looks. And he didn't need to either because James wasn't being a dick at all. Maybe this was the person Adrian was introduced to, perhaps James' wasn't as arrogant as he thought-

Actually _no,_ he was. It's just that he's got more quirks to his personality.

But Zamasu on the other hand… all three of them did not expect the Kaioshin to be relatively cool with driving with them, but Jay figured that that was the power of video games. He could go through a line of people he became great friends with through video games, they end up bringing people together. And maybe he had gotten used to how 'stupid' humans might seem from living with Irene _and_ Rebecca, and now he just doesn't care as much as he used to. However, Jay hoped his girlfriend gave him a disclaimer or something because he's surrounded by carefree _guys_ ; it would be a damn lie to say that they _didn't_ know how to stupidly have fun.

Adrian didn't think that Zamasu would end up being fond of him. He also didn't think that they agreed with a _lot_ of things- minus the fact that milk chocolate is better than dark- and he didn't see any sort of aversion unlike the first time he saw him. Especially because for anyone who knew the group, Adrian and Irene acted like _siblings_ ; they had such similar antics and behaviors, yet Zamasu related more with Adrian than with Irene. Adrian knew that this guy struck a nerve in his friend more than once, but if he could see a common ground with Zamasu then that means Irene could as well.

Zamasu had realized that the strange feeling he get when communicating with these guys wasn't the same as the unfamiliarity he'd get in general. It was different; it was weird but it didn't feel wrong, he didn't know how to put it in better words. Talking with these men seemed more comforting and less irritating than with both Irene and Rebecca. Not saying that Rebecca specifically irritated him but she was always restrained. She just seemed like she was holding so much back for the sake of keeping things a secret and that was starting to rub off on him. These guys were the exact opposite; they didn't care about what they said, because they _know_ what they're saying. That confidence is something he hasn't been exposed to in a long time.

Matter of fact, not that he thought about it, he could even feel this same vibe from Lexi, and he didn't speak much with her at all. He doesn't even look in her general direction (that's a lie), and he knew that she had a good grasp on herself and how she rolls. How could Rebecca have close friends who are so confident and mentally well-rounded, and yet she hasn't picked up on such attitude yet? That should be another indicator as to how distant she was with these people, even with _him_ as well. He hadn't realized that until now.

This sandwich shop had a mainly green theme to it. All the colors were light and not so saturated, but they were vibrant. The shop itself was small, it wasn't some giant restaurant or anything but a place that caters to a small amount of people. They stepped in and Zamasu got a whiff of all the different foods and drinks being made or brewed, as well as the quiet sound of people regularly talking. No one was too loud, and the place wasn't too quiet, even if two music producers, a basketball player, and a green pointy-eared man had walked in. Not to say that they didn't get stared at, because some of the people recognized the three human males, but their faces were also inquiring as to how some green guy ended up walking in with them in the first place.

Ever since Zamasu started going out in public, he would expect people to go into an uproar over his appearance as he, not in his own opinion, looked like an 'alien'. Wouldn't they panic at the idea of an alien walking into a shop, or anywhere for that matter? Instead, he did get a few weird looks, but they didn't outnumber the _gazes_ from other women at the airport. It made him wonder… are there other alien races here on Earth that humans had adapted to seeing in their day-to-day lives? He doesn't expect human society to accept another species in their own wake, because of how fearful they are.

The men had decided to take the empty table near the window while going directly to order. The table was a light green, and like Loguini's this place had booths as seats, but these booths were much more softer and were dark green. This entire place had an aesthetic, even the view outside was beautiful because all you could see was greenery, along with a large lake and trees. Jay, Adrian and James went to order, Adrian ordering for Zamasu while the Kaioshin went to sit at their table. He looked over the table; there was a small boxed container with sugar, sweeteners, black pepper and sea salt, along with napkins and a small bin with tiny booklets in it. This store not only was a catering place, these booklets looked like short stories that those who come in could read from. Zamasu also noticed that people stopped looking at him, they all just went about their day. Whether if they chatted about him or not was none of his business.

The three males came back just after Zamasu had picked up a random booklet. They would have taken a lot less time if the workers and the customers didn't recognize them, but they take the recognition with pleasure. Jay sat with James and Adrian sat across from them, next to Zamasu.

"So…" Jay propped his hand against his cheek. "Do you guys know about the thing the girls had planned next month?"

"What thing?" James looked up at Jay in confusion for a second, and then he recalled. "Oh _thaaaat_." And then he snorted. "Yeah, I think they're still trying to figure out a reasonable place."

"I'm pretty sure Lexi is trying to find one with all of three things; hot tubs, sparring rooms, and giant snowy mountains." Adrian shook his head with a smile. He looked over at Zamasu who was reading a booklet quietly. "I dunno if Irene would keep reservations for Zamasu."

The Kaioshin looked up at the mention of his name, and Jay chuckled. "Lexi is the one doing reservations, bro. She'll definitely invite Zamasu."

He frowned. "Invite me where?"

It's not that he wasn't listening, but he didn't know what they were talking about, or _where_ they were talking about. Adrian explained. "The girls had planned to take us all on a winter resort some time ago. Lexi, I think, is still trying to find the right resort for all of us." He looked at the other guys. "So far the three of us are going and our girlfriends. I think Rebecca is coming too, so that's seven people…"

"Irene might drag you along with us by the way." Jay added in, looking at Zamasu. "So that makes eight."

"What is a winter resort?" Because how could the Kaioshin go about the rest of the day without asking questions, even if they're obvious ones to the rest of us?

"A resort is a place where you uhh… chill out, I guess." James said, and Jay looked like he was about to punch him in the arm. "No pun intended, I swear."

"Basically a place to go for vacations and shit." Jay heard his name being called by one of the sandwich makers, that's what Zamasu called them, at the front counter. His whatever-he-ordered was ready. "I'ma be right back."

Adrian looked at his friend getting up for a second, and then he turned to Zamasu. "But yeah, it's a winter resort, so it's cold and snowy and you can go skiing or tobogganing…" Adrian stopped when Zamasu's face was nothing short of confusion. "You'll know what that is."

"How would I know?"

"When we get there." James smirked, and Zamasu gave him a look but returned the smirk back. _They're leaving me in suspense in order to get me interested in their human shenanigans._ Jay returned with a sandwich and bubble tea. The sandwich maker called another name, before they said one word in particular.

"Onyx-" The maker corrected himself quickly with a chuckle. "I mean Adrian."

Zamasu's head went up at the mention of that name, and he watched as Adrian got up to get his sandwich and their drinks on one tray. The Kaioshin frowned heavily; that word sounded _very_ familiar…

Adrian came back and placed Zamasu's tea in front of the Kaioshin. "That's yours."

Zamasu looked down at the teacup and back at the man who was now unraveling his sandwich. "Thank you." Did he already find out who the person that made those really catchy weird-upbeat songs is? Did this person happen to be the man sitting next to him? Is the case _cracked?_

A little girl walked in with her mother holding her hand. She had pigtails and there were two braids going on the sides of her face with little bead attached. The girl seemed to be skipping despite her mother's gentle hold on her hand and she had on a pink shirt with a black 'O', halfway down from that O was an 'X' of the same color. The outlines of the letters looked like reflective silver fabric. Her skirt was also fluffy a pink, and she had on pink leggings with pale-colored flowers on them and a little pouch with a handful of lollipops. Her face was cute and her cheeks were chubby and the way she smiled as she walked in made her giant brown eyes squint.

Zamasu didn't notice this girl the second she walked in, by the way. He noticed that she was tugging her mom's shirt and pointing at their table, directly at both the music producers who were speaking with one another. Her mother turned around but made eye contact with the Kaioshin, and he kinda averted his gaze because she looked really confused, but her daughter wasn't. She beckoned her mother to crouch down so that she could speak in her ear and her mother asked her something, to which the girl nodded. She then let go of her daughter's hand, and the little girl started walking, no, skipping or strolling towards the table. The three human males looked over and saw this little girl skipping, cutting their conversation as this girl approached them.

"Hello!" She came up to their table, and waved with a giant smile on her face. Her two front teeth were missing so she had that 'little kid' accent or something. You know what that meant.

"Heyyy." Adrian gave her a sweet smile and he looked down at her shirt. His smile got even bigger.

"I like you guys' music!" She said. She was swinging on the heels and soles of her feet ad she pointed to the shirt. The girl was so enthusiastic that she couldn't stay still, but she didn't act out much on that same enthusiasm. "My mommy likes it too."

"Aww, really?" Adrian couldn't help the smile on his face as she nodded jubilantly.

She looked at James. "My big brother watches you on TV. You're his favorite player."

James smiled. "Really?"

She nodded again, and then raised her arms as a gesture to hug, she was so cute.

"Can I get a hug from you guys?"

"Of course." His laid back voice made the little girl laugh and he hugged her while the other guys 'aww'd at the sight. Zamasu just sat there watching the exchange. These man, with whom Zamasu knew shared the same sentiment as he did, were here hugging another human being, another child of the same species that they also find annoying. He frowned, to see this same action amongst people who he had gotten along with the fastest was just as weird as how he was sitting here with these four men in the first place.

The girl looked up at Zamasu who at first was frowning, but then he blinked at her, and she blinked at him. She blinked again, and then she inquired. "Who is that?"

Adrian released her and she pointed at the Kaioshin right next to him, who actually didn't know how to answer that question without confusing her. Adrian just pointed at first to him and then she nodded, and he gave her the same simple answer Jay did. "He's a friend of ours."

"Ohhhh…" she nodded and looked at the Kaioshin with awe, almost mystified at his appearance. Zamasu leaned back slightly, she didn't show any fear towards his face and her brown eyes adorned nothing short of interest. "Hi!"

Zamasu is such an awkward fuck, so all he did was an awkward wave. It wasn't even a full wave, he like gently swiped his hand in the air horizontally and then placed it back down on the table, that's how awkward he was.

She tilted her head; due to children being intuitive as they are, she could see he felt some type of the way before the men did, so she stood up a bit straighter as she went into that little pouch of hers. She pulled out four lollipops and handed them out to the men, each of them thanking her. Jay even had to ask if this were going to empty out her candy pack, and she said it was perfectly fine.

The girl leaned over with her arm outstretched and a lollipop in her hand. To any other person, she had the _kindest_ smile on her face even though her front teeth were missing. Her big brown eyes made him lean backwards because they were so big and non-judgemental and bright. "Here you go, you look confused."

He slowly took the lollipop out of her hand and looked down at it, and then he looked at her. She was smiling, her innocence struck something in him subconsciously. "...Thank you..."

"You're welcome!" She jumped happily, as if him accepting the lollipop was great big news. Her mother started calling her name, and she looked back. The girl turned to the guys and waved them goodbye. "It was nice meeting you guys!" She then strolled to her mother, leaving the four guys to look down at their lollipops and talk about the exchange. Well, almost all of them, Zamasu was busy looking down at the lollipop trying to figure out _why_ she gave him the lollipop. If we could visually put his thoughts into pictures, it looks like a bunch of formulas running through his head at the speed of light.

He noticed all three of the men were giving him looks, and the Kaioshin blinked. "...What?"

"Someone's lookin' touched." Jay had a mischievous smirk on his face. "Don't act all stiff, you know that was adorable."

"It's just some human child giving me some… thing. I don't know what this is." Zamasu shrugged his comment off.

"It's a lollipop. It's candy, stuff is sweet." Jay answered.

"Well, okay, a simple _lollipop_. There's no big deal about that."

"Yes there is." Adrian sided with his friend. "Not for us, but for you."

"How?" The Kaioshin frowned. "Why would I make it a big deal?"

Both Adrian and Jay looked at each other, and then back at him. Jay spoke. "Why would you not make it a big deal?"

Zamasu blinked; these two were messing with him, weren't they? "That makes no sense."

James smiled. "It makes a lot of sense."

"Stay out of this!" Zamasu pointed his finger at James.

"You see?" Adrian articulated with a presenting gesture. "Making a big deal out of it."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes you are."

"I am not."

"Yes, you are."

"Are you going to argue with me?" Zamasu straight-faced, and Adrian smiled.

"Who said we were arguing?"

"I did."

"But we're not."

Zamasu leaned forward with a cross look. " _I said_ that we were arguing."

"Do you want an argument?" Adrian asked.

"No." Zamasu shook his head. "No I don't."

The simplest answer came from the producer. "Then stop arguing."

Zamasu blinked, frowned, tilted his head, and had a dumbfounded look before he shook his head. "You humans and your redundant mind games…"

"Bro, that wasn't redundant. You _just_ argued with me." Adrian started to laugh.

"No, I didn't! You started assuming that I was making a big deal about some little girl giving me a lollipop, and I told you that I wasn't making a big deal out of it."

Adrian raised a brow. "Are you?"

Zamasu flailed his arms, which was an unusual action from his because he was so rigid as a person. "Did you not hear what I just said?!"

"I did." Adrian nodded. "But are you not seeing what you've been doing?"

"I-" Zamasu stopped. He reclined into his seat, and then propped his elbows against the table with his finger against his temple. In lieu of him claiming that he wasn't making a big deal out of what just happened, not only did he get riled up in doing so which created a _bigger deal_ than it should, but he ended up arguing with someone about not arguing. He let out a deep breath and closed his eyes.

"You played yourself, my friend." James snickered.

Jay started to raspberry into a full-on laugh. "Don't let Adrian play these games on you, dude. You'll _never_ win."

This is coming from someone who can cast a cannonball of nothing but shade over somebody's whole life and that person would not notice a _thing_. This is coming from a person who masks emotion over words to make more of an influence on someone else's thoughts, though Zamasu didn't know that had actually occurred. He looked at Jay. "Thank you for the _warning,_ human."

"Hey, don't mention it." Jay winked at Zamasu's cross look.

Adrian frowned. "But I wasn't play any games-"

"Adri, stop it." Jay pointed a reprimanding finger at his fellow producer who cocked his neck back.

"Bruh, don't put your finger through my nose and shit." He held Jay's hand.

"I'm older than you so you should listen to me." Jay poked his tongue out, and then turned to James. "Yo, can you give me one of those booklets? I wanna look at 'em."

"You're only older than me by _one year_ , even less than that!" Adrian removed Jay's hand from his face, and the other pulled his hand away.

"How old are you all?" Zamasu was just curious, he wanted to know if these guys were within the same age range as Irene and Rebecca.

"Well, _I'm_ 26." Jay gestured to his poshly. "And this one here is 25, and that one is the same age as me but younger."

So Adrian is 25 years old, and James is 26 years old. Zamasu nodded with a raised brow as he did find Jay's posh self-importance amusing.

"We're all either 25 or 26. Ashley is only 24 and- wow, I was about to talk about the other group of people." James started laughing. "But yeah, this immediate circle though, all of us are in our mid-twenties."

"How old is Lexi?"

"Same age as Rebecca; she's 25." Adrian took a sip out of his bottle. Zamasu nodded, all of these seemed too old to be this young. Akin to how he felt two days ago when he learned that Rebecca was 25, he still thinks that they seem too old to be… this young? It doesn't make sense, but basically he sees that they act younger than they are, and in the case of these three men, they think much older than they act.

"I got a question; Zamasu." Jay raised a finger. "So umm… I kinda been peeping something weird about you and at first I just thought that was a quirk of yours and it still might be one but umm-"

"Is a good idea to ask him now?"

"James, shush." Jay snapped his finger at the other dude, who couldn't hide the smile on his face. "So… you've been looking at Lexi some type of way. Does she interest you?"

Zamasu literally looked like a deer caught in headlights… pink headlights that belonged to some car with fluffy tires and a spoiler made of candy wrappers because his response was as honest as it could possibly be. "I don't understand the question."

Adrian snorted, and Jay just shook his head. "Do you think she can be cool with you?"

"What? No, that's ridiculous." This time, Zamasu actually answered normally. He gave Jay direct eye contact with his statement, he looked very sincere with his response.

"How is it ridiculous?" Jay frowned.

"What do you mean _'How is it ridiculous?'_ This is your umm… significant other." The word 'girlfriend' sounded weird to him. "To ask me that would seem weird, wouldn't it?"

All three of them looked really confused, as if the Kaioshin blew something way out of proportion, and he _did_. Shouldn't it be _them_ doing that? James took the slowest bite out of his sandwich, Adrian's eyebrow went _way the fuck up his head_ , and Jay just tilted his and frowned.

So Zamasu inquired. "What's wrong?"

"We wanted to know if you would like to get to know her more." Jay furrowed one brow. "Because you seem to like talking to her a lot."

"Yeah, you were talking to her a whole lot back at Loguini's so we thought 'Hey, maybe you guys could be friends'."

Zamasu blinked like six times. "When did you all think of this?"

"While we were ordering sandwiches here." James chuckled.

"Oh, well- why, I guess that's fine by me…" Zamasu scratched the top of his head, ruffling his hair a bit. If he could exhale a breath of relief, he would. "But… how am I supposed to talk to her more if I am not living near her?"

All three of them had one solution and they said it at the same time. " _Phone._ "

That slim, rectangular boxed thingy that Rebecca uses to talk to people? Zamasu didn't even know how to turn the thingy on. "I don't know how those things work."

Adrian shrugged. "She can teach you, bro."

"... Oh."

Perhaps… perhaps he was hiding this weird thing for this woman very well, because it seriously looked like _none_ of these men were noticing the amount of confusion in the Kaioshin at the moment. That little girl was more accurate than anyone else who had asked how he's been. _You look confused…_ Well, damn right he was! Do they really think that he would want to befriend this woman? Do they really think that this human woman _hadn't_ caught his-

Wait… hold on… wait a minute, just a minute; this Kaioshin happens to be just that, a Kaioshin, and as of now an actual god amongst humans. He knows himself very well, well enough to know that humans are disgusting. He already made a vow that he did not like humans regardless of what sex they are, he just couldn't fathom the idea of liking another human being, that sounds terrifying. And Lexi _is_ a human, so for him to actually ask that one question… wouldn't it contradict everything that he's ever built up to accepting?

Not even that, what in his right mind would push him to think like that? Isn't this what he goddamned wanted, for them to _not_ suspect his actions as him liking her? And also, if he didn't like her, then why is he so apt to keep them from thinking that he does? These three men are mere humans; they can't do a thing if Zamasu admits this and decided to snatch the model up just for himself, but at the same time Zamasu himself doesn't know _how the heck he's feeling or thinking these things_. He doesn't know how he gets 'soft' around her, he doesn't know how she makes him do strange things, and he doesn't know why the idea of her boyfriend wanting to simply make them friends was so preposterous.

That was exactly a whole minute by the way. The author timed the reading of those two paragraphs.

"We're not forcing you to do anything, fam." James shrugged. "We just thought you two could be great friends. If you don't want that, then you don't have to get close to her and shit."

Zamasu blinked, they _really_ don't suspect anything. Score one for him, indeed. He didn't actually respond to what james had said, because something weird had caught his eye. There was this middle-aged woman somewhere on the farther side of the shop looking at their table, and if Zamasu could trace her sights, she was particularly looking at Jay. Though the producer didn't really notice this, and even Zamasu hadn't noticed this until now, this woman had an intense gaze locked on the samurai-bunned man and she was tapping her fingers against her arms, as if there was something she was waiting for. What she impatiently waiting for him to notice her? He couldn't even say because with the way she was sitting, it looked like she didn't want Jay to look at her. He looked at Adrian who was about to start something else to talk about, deciding to dismiss this woman's presence. The guys only talked for less than several seconds before that same woman finally stood up from her seat, and went directly for their table.

The woman quickly approached them very quickly. "Hello, there."

Adrian blinked, and so did the other men, at how forthright her greeting was. It wasn't like she waved or anything, she literally just walked up and stood in front of their table. Zamasu didn't really like her presence, so he intuitively chose to keep quiet, minding his own business while reaching for a booklet so that she wouldn't talk to him. The curly haired producer was that first person to break the two-second long silence. "Hey, umm…"

"I have a son who likes youse's music very much." She was gesturing loosely to Adrian and Jay. She then looked at Jay. "And he told me about you winning the World Tournament, I have no idea what it is called exactly, the name slips my name…"

"World Martial Arts Tournament?" Jay aided her in the name, and she nodded.

"Yes, that."

Adrian and Jay both smiled at the recognition the woman had for them, even if it was her son who liked their stuff. Adrian leaned forward a little in gratitude. "Aw, thanks! If only I could meet the kid I would've dapped him up."

Jay had the same warm smile on his face. Zamasu looked at the both of them before minding his own business again, they were genuinely grateful for what she said. "Yeah, thank you so much-"

"You know, I know all about you. And I hope you see the light before it's too late."

The four of them, went from smiling to adorning faces of varying degrees of confusion Even zamasu who was reading a booklet frowned at the book and glanced at Jay for a second. Jay blinked, because this woman was speaking directly to him. "Huh?"

"People like you are the reason why evil and the demonic are still in our world today."

Jay was _still_ confused. But he had figured that this woman was something towards the religious spectrum, which is not _wrong_ in itself. He was just trying to figure out what the heck she meant by that. "I'm sorry… _what_? What are you talking about?"

"Seek the father in heaven and repent and cleanse yourself of the impurity that is inside of you…"

He blinked. "Yeah yeah, _okay_ lady, what are you trying to get at? Why are you saying this?" At this point, all the gratitude Jay was showing was being stripped away. Not that he wasn't grateful for her son liking their music, this woman was just fucking things up.

She spoke slowly at first, as if Jay were some child who didn't comprehend human language. "You and every 'fighter' of that World Tournament are using demonic entities to aid you in fighting." She crossed her arms. "No human was given the power to make light from their hands. That is the mockery of the father up above."

 _What in the ferris wheel fuck?_ Adrian tilted his head so far to the right that Zamasu glanced over to see if the man's neck wasn't twisted or something. "Uhh… okay, listen. I'll break this down for you, real quick." Adrian knew, deep down, that trying to explain something to a extremely religious person was the equivalent of talking to a repetitive broken record, but it wouldn't hurt to explain things to others… wouldn't it? "That 'demonic' stuff that you've seen't, that's not demons, that's _ki_. That's life force, it's just energy that fighters can use when they are in combat."

"It's demonic energy! It is made from entities, it's not granted by the Lord at all!" She was exclaiming now, getting riled up at the fact that Adrian was trying to clear up her misunderstanding, which she took as him completely deeming her wrong. She _was_ wrong, but that's all she saw from his response.

"Ma'am." Jay placed, no, _dropped_ the small booklet that was in his hand and he looked up at her with a pissed off face. Adrian gave Jay a look, facially communicating his friend to calm down, because if there was a certain type of people that Jay absolutely disliked, it's those who believed in concepts and ideals _way too much_. "I can assure you that what fighters do is nowhere near 'demonic'." The Asian man didn't care anymore, he even made quotation gestures in the air. "Now, I know you have things to do other than trying to start an argument with me. So can you take this 'thank you' in regards to your son, and casually go about your day instead?"

"No! I will not _casually go about my day_." She sort of mocked his tone of voice but it was very minute, Jay caught it easily. She looked to Adrian. "Do you not see this? This energy must be cleansed from that poor boy's body!"

"First of all- no Adrian, let me say this." Jay had to steady himself and held his hand up at his friend who was about to pitch in two cents to this lady. " _First of all_ , I ain't no _boy_. I am a grown man, and you ought to speak to me like I _am_ one. Second," He would tap the table with emphasis to every few words. "I don't know what the _fuck_ book you're following or what drove you to just to start some other shit, but you came over here just to tell us that your son enjoyed our music. You're done, your objective was completed, so just go away now, and stop badgering me about the shit you believe that comes out of my hands."

"I came here to buy a soy latte!" She leaned forward, now angry with the Asian's 'impetuousness'. "And I did not expect to see a _dark_ person like you in this beautiful store. You…" she was vehemently pointing at Jay, and Adrian was hoping that his friend wouldn't slap her hand away, and possibly slap her face away too. "You poisoning the mind of my child with those demon hands of yours! How dare you try to shoo me away when I am bringing light to your ominous-"

"Lady, _back off._ "

The woman was cut off by James, who was sitting next to Jay. The basketball player just about had enough of this, and she looked at him. "You're in cahoots with this person?!"

"We're not in cahoots, dumbass." The hazel eyed man narrowed his eyes. "You're wasting your time, and _our_ time for that matter, rambling about shit that has nothing to do with him."

"It has everything to do with him!" At this point, this weird ass argument caught the attention of some people in the store. "You all are misguided, you all are in dire need to seeking the Light, every single one of you. _God_ will punish all of you!"

That was when Zamasu, who was _minding his own complete business_ in the middle of casually sipping tea, turned his head to look at her, and gently placed his cup back down on its coaster. "Excuse me?"

Jay's anger was replaced by him momentarily holding in his laughter at the way Zamasu swiveled his way into their argument. It seemed as though the woman freaked out when she heard Zamasu speak, which confused the three other guys because this green, pointy-eared, orange earring adorning, white haired, grey-eyed man was quietly sitting there the _entire time_. Did she not notice him or something? Well now she did, because she was pointing frantically at the Kaioshin. " _What are you?_ Are you a spawn of this man?" She was pointing at Jay who looked like he could ki blast her out of this store _right the hell now_.

"No. I am a _Kaioshin_ , not a 'spawn' of Jay." Adrian looked at Zamasu, giving him a _dude don't go into detail_ look. He understood, this woman was utterly dense and the epitome of ignorance. Zamasu looked back at Adrian, and the woman looked like she was gonna have some form of organ failure or something.

"The demon _speaks…"_ She shook her head in disbelief. "You all are terribly blind! All three of you, sitting with a demon right before my eyes! All of you, the three of you, you must repent before God! Cleanse yourselves of this satanic behavior, talking with intelligent _demons-_ have you not done your reading? This demon is here to possess all three of you. Don't let this fiend fool you, and don't take my words lightly, you will be marked by its strike! I am here to show you all this, to show you all the right path, how dare you all take stride against the light that is blessed by our heavenly father, this _demon_ is nothing but a fiendish being trying to lead you three men into Hell's Pit!"

Both Adrian and Zamasu slowly turned their head back to the woman as she spoke with the most dismayed, confused, annoyed, appalled looks on their faces. There was a pause, before the both of them spoke the same exact words at the exact same time.

"... _Are you fucking retarded?_ "

The three guys collectively were shocked to hear Zamasu _swear_ , though Adrian was giving the woman a confusticated look to show that. James had to hold in the snort that was threatening to make its way out of his mouth, though he quickly collected himself to address the woman. "Seriously, just go. Get your soy latte, and get the fuck out of here. This case is dismissed, goodbye. _Have a nice day._ "

This woman was getting so riled up, that the security guards had to come over to carry her out and she was yelling at them as she was being pulled out of the store. "You all will go to hell! Talking with full-fledged demons, you _infidels_! God will strike you all-" Her yelling was cut off because the door closed. Everyone in the shop looked at the closed door for a moment, then at the table where she ranted at, and then continued on about their day.

A silence settled between the four guys, and Zamasu casually sipped more of his tea, shaking his head at the stupidity of that woman. He scoffed… and to think that _Irene_ was _stupid_ …

"To be honest, like halfway through that I was gonna bust out laughing because of the way Zamasu just turned his shit." Jay laughed.

James finally allowed that laugh to come out. "Me too, he was like-" James swerved his head calmly in his seat, imitating what Zamasu did in a comical way. "I'm sorry what? I heard my name."

"Honestly… I'm just shocked that you fucking cursed too." Jay looked at the Kaioshin who looked up at him as well. "That's the first time I heard you say a curse word."

"It's… actually the first time I ever cursed."

"Really?!" Adrian looked at him, and Zamasu nodded. "Well… now I know that religious people piss you off too."

"Religious?" Zamasu raised a brow.

"Yup. She was one of those _bible thumpers_ if you will. She was dense enough to think that ki energy is some demon shit." Jay sighed and rolled his eyes, thoroughly annoyed at the whole exchange and Adrian reached out to hold his friend's shoulder.

"Listen man, at least you didn't break the damn window with her face."

"I _would have..._ but I like this place. Would have given her a nasty look, but she already had one." Jay looked down and smirked with an annoyed chuckle. "It's nothing, really, she was just annoying. What I'm more worried about is that son of hers, hope he's not being castigated or some shit."

"Hope he's not at home with her everyday. I can't imagine living under a bubble like that." Adrian shook his head in post-frustration.

Zamasu shared the same sentiment as the others, except a little different. Yes, he found it annoying, but he found the woman's relating of ki to ominous uses very disrespectful to him. That's mainly because he himself has learned to conjure and control ki very well, so hearing some random stranger tell you that your _ki_ comes from something else that you have no involvement with is like spitting in the face of your very prowess. That's probably why he sensed the anger in Jay rising up much faster than the two other men, even Adrian himself, but since Jay has had more exposure to his ki, her words had more of an annoying impact on him.

"So uhh… Zamasu, since you're a god and all..." James was looking down at his drink. "You're not gonna strike us down, are you?"

Zamasu looked up at James. There was no taunting in his eyes once again, James wasn't trying to insult him in any way. He was being playful, and Zamasu could see that. The Kaioshin smirked. " _No promises_."

"Woow, that's not fair." Adrian narrowed his eyes at Zamasu.

"But promising anything would be considerably unfair, would it not?" The Kaioshin closed the booklet, and looked at Adrian.

Adrian chuckled seeing the smirk on Zamasu's face. Then he nodded. " _Fair play_."

The guys had their fair share of laughter, as if that whole ordeal was completely wiped out of them, which it was. Zamasu's unfamiliarity started to shift; no longer was he feeling weird around these men, and he had realized this later today while James was driving them back to Adrian's house. In fact, he wasn't feeling the need to sit back and question his actions with these three guys around him for some reason, and they were all closely affiliated with the one woman that he despised. As confusing as it sounds, that fact alone was the one thing that he'd ask himself for a short time; _why am I somewhat more comfortable with these people?_ This time, he'll find that he won't be questioning it…

Until after seeing the stupid shit he's about to get into.

XIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIX

"I really like this controller." They were back in Adrian's house, and James had left more than a hour ago for his drills. Zamasu was _reclined_ against the couch inspecting the glowing controller in his hand with approval. They had just finished playing rounds of Speedrunners once more because _competition_. According to Jay, the women were still out and busy since he had called them the second he touched the front door, so now it was the three of them left together.

"They're all the same, dude." Adrian laughed.

"No, I meant the color. This rosy color, I like it." Zamasu turned it around to see its sleek black with the rosy red lights pulsing out of it. It looked like an aesthetic.

"See?!" Jay articulated at the two. "You know James calls that shit red." Jay shook his head. "It's not red, it's fucking _rose colored!_ "

Adrian blinked at Jay, and then shook his head at Zamasu. "Don't mind him, people mistaking the exact names of colors triggers him." He shouldn't have said that, otherwise he wouldn't have been slapped on his broad chest. "Umm… _ow? That hurt?"_

"Understandable." Jay dismissed him and looked at the furrow-browed Zamasu. "You two wanna watch something? I can put something on for y'all."

Adrian looked up. "I think we should w-"

Jay mushed his face, covering his mouth while looking at the Kaioshin. "I didn't ask you, I was asking Zamasu."

Adrian moved Jay's hand from his face. "You said us two."

"But I wasn't looking at you."

Adrian stood up and slinged Jay over his shoulder, and then looked at Zamasu who was confused as usual. "This happens everyday. It's just how Jay is, you know. _Tsk, tsk._ " He shook his head accusatively. Zamasu chuckled.

"I'll blast your leg off if you don't put me down." Jay's face was on Adrian's back, and his arms were flailing.

"That's not nice." Adrian placed his friend back on the sofa. "And it's not nice to exclude people. That's very mean."

"Oh shut it, you fucking pansy." Jay laughed, and Zamasu couldn't help the growing smirk on his face at their interaction. "Fine then, what would the _both of you_ like to watch?"

Zamasu had been watching a bunch of movies and some snippets of shows when he was at Rebecca's house. There was one in particular that actually managed to make him laugh; yes, Zamasu the rigid Kaioshin, actually found a show _funny_. He wanted to see something comical on TV at the moment, even though laughing is rare for him, but the name of the show seemed to escape him…

"I could go for Tom and Jerry. I haven't watch that in so long…"

That was the name that he was looking for! "I was thinking of the same show."

"You know about Tom and Jerry?" Jay smiled. He pulled out a touch screen pad and turned it on, searching for the show they agreed to watch. The pad looked like the one in Rebecca's house, except it wasn't mounted to the sofa. "Hell, I'll put it on. I miss seeing real rivalries."

"If you want a real rivalry, I'll call your cousin right now and tell him you ain't placing." Adrian smirked at the way Jay sat up at the mention of his cousin.

"That mcfucker ain't coming close to me, he's busy tryna solve crimes and shit."

"I don't think the director of the FBI is the one doing the crime solving." Adrian raised a brow. "He's keep shit in check, he's placing more than you are."

"Umm, says the guy who got drunk and broke a prized possession of mine." Jay frowned, and Adrian's face faltered.

" _Don't_ bring that up, I said I was sorry! _"_

The doorbell rang, stopping the two from the argument. Adrian got up and opened the door to see James. "Heyyyy… you're here pretty early."

James dapped him up, his other hand had a container of something. "You do realize that two hours had passed, right? We had a short drill, and the rest of the time we just kinda… chilled and sort of partied."

"How do you chill _and sort of_ party? You've shown us vids of your team, you guys are always hype." Adrian laughed, and allowed the man in the house.

Jay and Zamasu waved at James and he greeted them as well. The guys had sat down, and James placed the container into the kitchen without explaining what it was. Zamasu narrowed his eyes as he did get a glimpse of the contents within; it looked like something chocolatey, and we all know that you don't just _hide_ tasty things from a God. While the guys were watching Tom and Jerry, Zamasu noticed that they were getting into it and he was too, but his focus shifted onto something else instead. The Kaioshin stood up and moved out of their way, watching as they paid no mind and were laughing at Tom's infamous scream once more. He was behind their couch towards the lower hallway, and he raised his hand to telekinetically grab the container out of the kitchen. Once it was in his hands, he levitated his way into the hallway and away from the living room silently.

The guys seriously didn't notice. They were too busy cracking jokes about the show and laughing at its ridiculousness. Once the episode had ended, Adrian looked at James. "'Ey, say James, what's in that container you brought in?"

Jay raised a brow. "As far as I know, I saw brown stuff in there. Are they brownies?"

James looked at the both of them. "Well… yes and no."

The two music producers looked at him. They mirrored the same expression sitting next to one another. "Huh?"

"Those are brownies, yes, but they're _special_ brownies." James smirked.

It took the two a bit longer to understand that sentence, until finally, Adrian answered calmly. "They're edibles."

"Yup." James nodded slightly.

Meanwhile, Jay frowned deeply. "Why would you bring edibles to our house?"

"Okay… I didn't intentionally bring them here." James shifted, getting ready to explain the story behind the edible brownies. "I saw a bunch of brownies just sitting in the lounge room and they looked really good, so I took ten of them-"

"TEN?!" Jay exclaimed, and Adrian held his finger over Jay's lips.

"Continue." Adrian said, and Jay looked at him with a pout.

"I took ten of them, put 'em in a container right before I left the lounge. One of my dudes called me and asked 'dude did you eat the brownies?' and I said 'No, I didn't. I just took them, why?'. He told me that all of the brownies were really strong edibles. Explains why there was like fourteen of them when they're were thirty of us, so… that's the story behind that."

"...Makes sense." Adrian removed his finger from Jay's lips. "Did you eat any of them afterwards?"

"Nope. All ten of them are in the container, just sitting in the kitchen. I dunno if you guys would wanna refrigerate them for later or some shit."

Jay got up and started towards the kitchen, but Adrian grabbed his shirt. "Dude, calm down. They're not gonna jump into our mouths, they're just edibles."

"I know, I know. I'm just gonna actually label it before one of you idiots accidentally eat one." Jay released Adrian's hand from his shirt despite Adrian's cross look.

"I remember the first time I had one." James shook his head. "I accidentally ate a whole edible cookie… couldn't walk straight."

Adrian laughed. "Remember that one time when Vivian called us and he was high as fuck?"

"Oh my fuck, I remember the first thing he said." James cracked up and the both of them quoted the fashion designer at the same time. " _Did you guys know that penguins can't speak Chinese?_ "

"-man he was fucking out on it." Adrian and James' laughter filled the living room as they recalled all the times they have, someone they knew, had gotten high. All was fun and games, until the sound of Jay's stern voice cut the air.

"James..." Jay called out the basketball player's name, exiting out of the kitchen with a slightly fretful look on his face. "Where are the edibles? Did you throw them out?"

James and Adrian looked back at the other male. James raised a brow. "No, why?"

Jay came out of the kitchen. "They're not in here."

The two males on the couch sat up, and Adrian frowned. "Wait what?"

James frowned. "I literally left them on the countertop, how do you not see them?"

"Bruh, I deadass don't see them anywhere in the kitchen-" A thought ran through Jay's head. " _Shit_."

It seemed as though Adrian even caught the drift. "Uhh, where's Zamasu?"

"I'm here." The Kaioshin came out from the lower hallway with the container that _once_ had _ten_ brownies. Now there only sat two brownies with Zamasu eating one as he entered the living room. Jay fumbled and then started fast walking towards the oblivious green man.

"ZAMASU! THOSE AREN'T REGULAR BROWNIES!" He was flailing his arms as he walked too, looking comically frantic.

James shook his head. "Jay's boutta have a heart attack."

"But… they taste like brownies, do they not?" He picked up the second to last one right before Jay snatched the container from him. "Excuse you-"

"Give me that!" He went back into the kitchen, and looked back at Zamasu. "Do not touch this one!"

"How many are left?" Adrian looked back at Jay.

Jay came back out the kitchen and let out a heavy breath. "There's one left."

"WHAT?!"

Both James and Adrian jumped up at the revelation, looking carefully at Zamasu who was casually going to sit down on the couch and reclined into the comfy seating. He was still eating the last bit of the brownie he took before Jay hauled the container from him. Adrian and James gave one another a look, and then back at him.

"Umm… Zamasu? Jay wasn't joking around when he said that." Adrian pointed at the piece of brownie in Zamasu's hand. "Those were edibles."

In the Kaioshin's head, any type of food that you can eat is an edible because well… they were edible. So he just shrugged at what Adrian said. "What's the problem with that?"

James sighed, and Adrian continued explaining. "Those have fucking _weed_ in them. People usually have a piece because it's too potent, if one person eats a whole edible they'll probably start convulsing or some shit." Zamasu knew what weed or marijuana was, because of all the things he had read on his free time while being on Earth.

"That stuff is way too strong! You're not supposed to eat more than like a _quarter_ of one brownie!" Jay walked over to stand in front of Zamasu with a sort of reprimanding face, and hands on his hips.

James looked at the Kaioshin. "Weed gets you hella fucking high, dude. An edible is just about enough to make you think really stupid shit."

"Have you three forgotten that I'm not a human?" Zamasu ate the tiny piece, dusting his hands off poshly. "I'm a Kaioshin. No type of plant-drug would have any effect on me, I am a god." He spoke in an obvious tone, criss-crossing his legs while still leaning back.

"You don't understand." Jay shook his head. "You ate _nine_ of them."

"Nine edibles won't do anything to me. I'm not like the three of you." He shrugged.

Adrian blinked. "Are you sure about that?"

"Yes."

And that was it. Zamasu cut the conflict short, and Adrian slowly nodded. "Alright then, just… making sure."

James sighed again, he took the controller game and looked at Adrian. "One more episode?"

A sigh. "I'm down for that. Jay, sit down. I'm sure he's fine." Adrian literally pulled Jay's arm down making him plop down right next to his side. Jay ended up really close to Adrian and his face was leaning forward in front of Adrian's view.

Jay looked down at his own lap, and back at Adrian. He had to crane his neck up a little because he was in close proximity to the other man. "Word?"

Adrian nodded. "Uh-huh. Move."

Jay groaned and flicked Adrian's forehead. "Dork."

"Can you two just kiss already?" James smirked at the two, and the both of them gave him a look. "You both act like a low-key couple."

"I'm not the one who's open to dating guys like this one." Adrian was throwing a tiny bit of shade and it made Jay pinch his side, _hard_. "Ow man! Shit hurts!"

"Your shit isn't supposed to hurt." Jay shook his head, as if he didn't just squeeze the fuck out of Adrian's right oblique. "That's concerning. You should probably see a doctor."

He shook his head. "Ugh, you piece of shit."

"My point still stands corrected." James chuckled.

"Don't make me blast you out this room. I would never date _this one_." Jay pointed at Adrian who gave him a knowing look. Jay supplemented the stupid smirk on Adrian's face with a frown. "You know damn well that's true."

"I'm not saying that it's _not false_." That earned another form of assault from Jay which was him pulling his ear, something that Adrian absolutely _hated_. "Can you _not_ do that?" Jay gave him a look, and then he harrumphed and released his ear, moving off of Adrian to sit normally.

The Kaioshin found those brownies to be really tasty, which was weird because they were simple, baked bars of chocolate with aforementioned weed in them. But then again, anything involving chocolate tasted amazing to him. He shook his head; no amount of man-made substances could ever get to someone like him. As a Kaioshin, it shouldn't be surprising that his body was much stronger and much more capable to withstand things compared to a mere humans. They are literally fragile bags of bones compared to him, so something as simple as weed would be innocuous to him.

He thought back to the whole scope of the entire day. For some reason, it felt like one whole day had passed and they were in the middle of another with how much that has went on, and with the amount of things Zamasu has learned in a short amount of time. In reality, Rebecca and Zamasu had arrived at Adrian's house late this morning, and it was nearing the evening right now. The guys and he were watching some old, timeless legendary cartoon show and the three were laughing their asses of, reveling in the nostalgia. Zamasu had chuckled here and three, but he was too busy thinking back to what had occurred in the past few hours.

A lot of things have _changed_ in him; before he even came here, you wouldn't dare to even think that this regal, stiff Kaioshin would become well-acquainted with three guys who did not give two rat nails about being rigid. This was the same behavior Irene had in essence, except a little different; it was different because they weren't trying to bite at him or who he was. In fact, Zamasu didn't think they'd just casually answer his questions about justice without giving him elusive and inconclusive answers. To be fair though, they were being somewhat hypothetical at points, but it was better than them keeping quiet about the subject. Something became very apparent to Zamasu after that whole conversation...

You'd think that when justice was mentioned, Zamasu would be _more than_ open and articulative about justice because that's what he likes to see, but he stayed quiet through most of that conversation. One, because he didn't expect them to speak as much as they did, and two… because he realized that he really hadn't thought out what he had always perceived.

When it comes to Gowasu, he'd be more than apt to ask questions, not to counteract what his mentor is saying, but for the purpose of knowing _more,_ of seeing more to this what what he can see. His mentor gave him the same answers over and over, and Zamasu had gotten frustrated over how contradicting they seem. But when it came to _these three men_ , these mere humans before him, they proposed such a dialogue that didn't frustrate Zamasu at all. They themselves were even a little questioning about the idea of justice as well, but what truly caught his attention was how moderate they were with their inputs. Not one person believed too hard in one ideal or the other, nobody had a concrete answer that they stuck to while getting emotionally attached to them.

Perhaps this type of attitude caught and intrigued him because he hasn't learned how to do that yet. They were polar opposites; Zamasu believed too hard in the idea that humans knew nothing and therefore were nothing, and the men weren't extreme with what they perceived. They found no reason to enforce their line of thoughts onto one another, so they heard each other's opinions and simply replied to them. Zamasu never done that; he'd leave a conversation that didn't believe the exact same ideals that he did the second the person disagrees with him. Zamasu hadn't learned how to separate the ideals from the person, and luckily he wasn't completely embodying his means of justice. Zamasu didn't realize any of this.

The conversation could have went on much longer if they didn't get up and out and into Loguini's, and also if there weren't two women waiting for them in the process. That brought up another bunch of information that he had learned pertaining to Lexi and _definitely_ with Rebecca. He never could fathom the idea of someone like Rebecca going out of her way to potentially ruin someone else's life financially, and even sleeping around with other men. It kind of did make sense; her actions nowadays were borderlining on overly-generous, from what he could see it looked like she has been trying to atone for her past behaviors. But at the same time, with the attitude that she presented at Adrian's home, it said something different.

The laissez-faire attitude of the guys, when pertaining to how standoffish she was the day Lexi visited her house, was reasonable. Like Jay said, she seemed volatile, and Zamasu can see an overall instability in the woman. How can you possibly still be upset about something that occurred when you were technically still really young as an _adult_? And _why?_ What was the purpose of doing those horrid things?

These guys were well balanced overall; well-balanced people and unstable people can't sit in the same boat together. Because if they did, the boat wouldn't stay afloat, it would sink.

Only five days had passed, and there was so much new information that he needed to process. It make him wonder; would he have figured all of this stuff out had he stayed with Irene, had she not left him under Rebecca's roof? He probably wouldn't have known about video games or even _pizza_ if it weren't for that woman leaving the country. All of this happened because, well, Lexi asked him, and he complied. If he hadn't done that, if he had said no to her offer, he would not've had an admittedly interesting conversation with Irene's guy friends and her boyfriend. He wouldn't have been acquainted with the bunch, and he wouldn't have gotten to learn more about Lexi. He wouldn't have gotten more clues as to why Rebecca is the way she is, and how the guys can see through her better than he can at the moment.

None of that would have happened if he denied her offer.

In fact if he took this a bit further, he wouldn't have cherished Rebecca's dogs more and developed a friendship with two innocent canines if Irene hadn't left. He wouldn't have watched some movie about a toaster and his kitchen appliance friends with analogous behaviors to human society, he wouldn't have even knew a _thing_ about movies and shows. He wouldn't have listened to music and learn that he had a versatile taste in different genres, and most importantly, he wouldn't have been gifted an _expensive box of chocolates_ from a woman he particularly find really pretty. None of that would have happened if Irene had stayed.

The greatest thing about that box though, is that most of chocolates were variations of either dark or milk chocolate. There was barely any white chocolate, but when he tried it he found it tasted too overly sweet. Whoever made that box knew their chocolates indeed… does Lexi like white chocolate? Maybe she knew that white chocolate also tasted weird and got one with barely any white chocolate in it, maybe she likes dark chocolate. He should have asked her that while he was in Loguini, because that is very important information.

That's what you do with important information; you need to see what it is in order to know if it is important or not.

Zamasu could swear that if chocolate wasn't toxic to dogs, he would have given one to Ollie or Loki. Those two would sit and eat with him while he read a book or something. He wondered if they had known the word chocolate before actually seeing it. What if they named chocolate in a different way than how humans did?

What if they gave _him_ a name? What if they gave Rebecca a name too?

What if they gave _themselves_ a name?

This whole inquiry-fest could be comparable to the 'Why is water wet' question, which we all know is not actually a question because… water _is_ wet. Even ice is wet, like when you touch it and your warm hands melt little bits of the surface. If water wasn't wet, then what would it be? How else would you describe something that's wet in a way that _doesn't_ make it sound so? Zamasu frowned, because if water wasn't wet, then water wouldn't be wet at all. So since it's the opposite of dry, which is wet, then therefore water is indeed wet.

And water is pretty much everywhere, like go to one ocean and proclaim that there is no water. Go to any body of water and say that it isn't wet, even if there is water in it. Go to any grassland and say that there is no grass in it. Wander a large forest and say that there is no grass in it; there obviously is and it's right there in front of you. To say that the grass on a grassland or the water in an ocean isn't there would be stupid, if there was no water, it wouldn't be an ocean. If there was no grass, it wouldn't be a grassland.

If there was no water in the sand and the gravel, there wouldn't be concrete. And without concrete, there wouldn't be buildings, and without building there wouldn't be humans. Rather, if there were no humans, then there wouldn't be buildings. Go to a building of any size and say that there aren't or weren't humans in or near there. Without buildings, where would the humans be? In grasslands with no grass? By oceans with no water? Grasslands need grass to be grasslands, and oceans need water to be oceans. Concrete needs water, sand, and gravel in order to be gravel, and building need humans in order to be buildings. They're not gonna just up and build themselves, that's not how things work. They need components that help them become what they are. It's an easy concept and can be applied to anything.

Without Kaioshins, there wouldn't be a universe. They are the creators, the masters of the grand life force, what is a universe without its creator? Nothing, the universe needs a creator in order to be a universe. And without a universe, this Earth wouldn't have came to fruition, the countries and cities within wouldn't have been inhabited, and the animals and humans here wouldn't have existed.

That also means that chocolate wouldn't exist, and chocolate needs cacao beans to be fermented and grinded by humans in order to be chocolate. Imagine a universe without friggin' _chocolate_ ; by Kami that would be terrible. You know what's even worse? _Pizza wouldn't exist_. That flat, giant pancake thing made of tomatoes, cheese and seasoned bread that tastes like heaven's personal cuisine on a tray wouldn't have existed if there was no Earth, if there was no _universe_. So what does that say? Things needs things to happen, things need a catalyst, a reason to be the way they are.

And therefore, that is why water is wet.

The three guys were still watching Tom and Jerry and they were laughing and commentating on behalf of the show, or at least that's what Zamasu thought, because right now he was so into his own thoughts that everything exterior was cancelled out. Everything that he had realized under the influence was all of his thoughts… under the influence of weed brownies. And here's the thing; they weren't lying when they said it was potent either, and since the Kaioshin was much stronger than the humans in this house obviously nine whole brownies in one sitting would only do what a partial brownie did to a human, which would get them _high as heck._ The first hour was normal, Zamasu didn't feel a thing, and another hour later, now that he's been doing nothing but thinking, he could swear that he wasn't feeling a thing. Is this what weed does to you?

In reality though, those two hours were actually forty five minutes, and Zamasu was high, but not high as heck. The Shinjin could still think coherently enough to tell the laughing from the guys weren't random noises that didn't make sense. He could still tell their voices from the sound of the television, which was playing the usual swingy music that starts whenever Tom was chasing Jerry, and for reason the song sounded super funny to him. He didn't laugh or anything, he just frowned at how funny it sounded.

And also, in reality, Jay and James were doing most of the talking as of now, because Adrian laid a glance on the Kaioshin who was abnormally quiet within the past three-quarters of an hour. Usually, Zamasu would have turned seeing that Adrian was looking at him because intuition is a fun gift when you can feel eye contact on you. But he didn't. He didn't even acknowledge it, and Adrian was starting to get a little concerned.

"Umm…" he looked between his friends. "You guys…"

Jay turned to Adrian. "Yeah?"

James did the same, turning to his right. "What is it?"

"If Zamasu 'aight?" Adrian leaned forward to see Zamasu. "He's been staring at the ceiling for twenty minutes."

"Twenty?" James frowned. "You counted?"

"Bruh I'm assuming, because when we were watching the last episode, he was doing that. And now the episode is finished, and he's _still_ doing that."

Jay turned to look at Zamasu as well, who had this semi-glazed over look and a faint smile, deeply into his thoughts. The Asian blinked, and then nodded. "He's 'aight."

"He looks _high beyond belief_." James cracked up. He even raised his hand to snap his fingers in Zamasu's direction. "Holy fuck, is he even _here_?"

"He's in La La Land." Jay couldn't even say the whole sentence without laughing, and James joined him.

"Yo, Zamasu." James called his name out once. There was no response, so he did it again, and still got no response. The guys quieted down, and they collectively said his name. " _Zamasu!"_

He just blinked and casually looked over at them as if one of them had quietly called his name. Nothing but his head moved, and the guys could familiarize what stage he was in at being high; the 'everything is heavy as fuck' stage. They all doubted that he would move his arms or legs because they probably felt like they individually weighed 592 pounds, and he didn't look dazed or anything, he was just _chilled out_. The guy had never seen him look like that before. "Hmm?"

That's all he said, and that surprised the three with how nonchalant his response was. Adrian popped the question. "Are you alright, fam?"

"I'm okay."

"Do you want something to drink?" Jay asked.

"Nope." This all-time serious God of Creation just said _nope._ That is how you know he's high as _hell_ , forget _heck_.

"We're about to play a video game, by the way." James added in. "You want in?"

"Nope." He shook his head, and then he went back to the aforementioned La La Land he was in.

The three guys looked between one another, wondering if they should say more or intervene with Zamasu's thought wagon, but they each thought back to the last times they have gotten high. They couldn't stop laughing at every little thing, and it was like 4 in the morning that they were in this state of weird euphoria, questioning everything and having conversations about nothing. Then afterwards, they'd get hungry. They'd get so hungry that a whole box of Chinese food wouldn't be enough to fill their stomachs so they'd order a reasonable amount of boxes, which was around like eight, no big deal. And they'd eat that all up, rinse and repeat until their high faded, and finally they'd be tired as shit. It's not like they didn't want this Kaioshin to experience those same effects due to fact that he was high, and it's not like they didn't want him to end up eating their whole refrigerator within the next couple of hours. So the three had devised a proactive plan in order to compensate for Zamasu being high, each agreeing to the plan at hand.

"You guys wanna share that last brownie?" James asked the two, and they didn't even need to consider this proactive idea.

"Fuck it, we'll share it." Jay shrugged, and Adrian got up to get the brownie container. The last brownie sat pliantly, waiting for the three gentlemen to consume it.

"Equals, fellas." Adrian opened the container and took out the brownie, dividing it equally amongst the other guys. The three ate the edible altogether, as a means to mitigate Zamasu's altered state of mind. He would be going through the stages along with three men in the living room…

Because they damn sure aren't gonna let him get high by himself.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Mind = Blown…**

 **Y'all don't understand how much I laughed my ass off writing the last portion of this chapter. No, I wasn't high like Zamasu either. And no, I totally didn't purposely make Zamasu get high on his first day of the** _ **fourth**_ **month on Earth, in the** _ **twentieth**_ **chapter of the story. Pfft, that totally wasn't on purpose.**

 **I debated on whether or not I should leave the name of the God the woman worshipped out, and I chose to be a little bit more ambiguous with the conversation. I'm not gonna lie, one of my thoughts was to give him a variant name like Jenkins but then I thought that would be a** _ **little**_ **too controversial. Can you imagine a religion based on father Jenkins? I'm sorry XD**

 **Well, well,** _ **well…**_ **it looks like Zamasu has ended up becoming more comfortable with the males of the group, whom of which had an enlightening conversation with him about chocolates and justice. What more can one ask for?**

 **Y'all, let's spark up some conversation; with the newfound similarities he has with the guys, I mean it took him a day to get accustomed to how they are, what would this entail for the Kaioshin? Would his experiences now bleed into his day-to-day things with Rebecca, or Irene even?**

 **The next chapter won't be as long as these two, I apologize if you guys had gotten tired of scrolling so much through these genius *AHEM* chapters. That was sarcasm. And by the way, the short hiatus is over, and school is gonna start in like two weeks from now.**


	21. Walking the Fish Bowl Early in the Week

**I'm not even gonna comment. I'll just leave this as it is. Enjoy;** _ **best served cold**_ **.**

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 **Walking the Fish Bowl Early in the Week's Month**

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Can you imagine a sight where three humans males get high with a God? In a rather nice, spacey living room? And all of which were either getting something or staring off into space?

Well, the author shall feed your imagination as to what happened after the two music producers and the basketball player decided to share one single brownie amongst each other.

Adrian's living room was silent, because the TV was turned off a while ago. The four were initially sitting on the sofa, but now Jay had just gotten up to get something from the kitchen. Adrian was next to James, and Zamasu was still on the adjacent side of the sectional sofa, this time he wasn't staring at the ceiling. Grey eyes were also gazing somewhere off in the distance along with Adrian and James. The video game the three played was turned off as well, but they still had their controllers on the coffee table, or on their laps.

They had ordered Snacky Bundles sometime ago as well, because all of them were obviously hungry. A snacky bundle is a large box with a customizable bunch of chips, sweets and candies meant to serve a group of people. Even though it is widely used for parties and hangouts, a lot of stoned people order these bundles when they have 'munchies' because a lot of the snacks in there are literally munchie material. One box is enough for a dozen or more people, but they ordered _three whole boxes_ of this stuff and ate every single snack in the bundles. Yes, all four of them, four males ate the same amount of food to serve at least _forty eight_ people.

This is what weed does to you.

All of the boxes were empty and now sitting in the kitchen. Jay returned with a bottle of juice, sitting next to Adrian. Zamasu moved to sit next to Jay.

"Guys, I bought a thing of juice, I dunno if it's gonna be enough for us."

Adrian looked at Jay. "If anything… that's not gonna be enough for the four of us." He was articulating as he spoke. "If there's four of us and only one bottle of juice, that's not gonna be enough because one bottle is not gonna be enough for the four of us."

"Exactly dude, I'm trying to get a drink too." James added in. "It ain't gonna be enough because we're trying to drink together, and we can't drink together if we only have one bottle."

"And if we don't have enough juice then we can't all drink juice because we don't have enough juice for all of us to drink."

"Exactly! You know what, I'll hook you guys up with some then- oh." Jay had realized that he had three other bottles of the same juice in his jogger pockets, and he only pulled out one for himself. So he brandished a bottle for each and every one of them. "I mean, I dunno if I could drink these because they're not from the fridge. Like, the ones from the fridge are usually good when they're cold."

"But it doesn't matter though, because… your drink plus the three drinks equals four, and the three drinks plus your drink equals four." James pointed to the small bottles respectively. "So that means we could all drink together. And all the drinks together means that we could drink juice together."

"Yeah, exactly but like… these drinks aren't from the fridge so I dunno if it's gonna be cold or not because, you know, sometimes the drinks that aren't from the fridge aren't cold. And at the end of the day, the drinks that are from the fridge are the ones that are cold, and the ones that are cold are the ones from the fridge."

"Ohhh, so if these were from the fridge, then they would be cold?" Zamasu inquired.

"Yup, exactly what I'm saying like…"

The Kaioshin frowned. "That's stupid, because it's cold if it's from the fridge, so if it's not from the fridge then what the heck?"

"Exactly!" Adrian snapped his fingers at Zamasu in agreement. "You know what, I'll go get some ice so that these drinks could be cold." He stood up with his bottle in hand.

"You know, ice is a savior, dude." James smiled. "Because if we didn't have ice, then these drinks wouldn't be cold, and they wouldn't be cold if we didn't have ice."

"Exactly, and the ice is from the freezer, which is next to the fridge so if the ice wasn't in the freezer then we wouldn't have any ice." Jay shrugged.

"But that also means if we didn't have ice, then these drinks wouldn't be cold." Zamasu added in.

"Right! And if they're not cold, then they're not refrigerated, and these drinks taste the best when they're refrigerated."

"And it's only right that we'd have a fridge, because without a fridge then we wouldn't have cold drinks." James pointed.

Jay nodded. "Yo, that is true dude. Like, one time I need to cool something down, right. So I put it in the fridge in order for it to cool because a fridge is what cools things down and what cools things down is a fridge."

"And you had a fridge there in order to cool it down, so that thing wouldn't have been cooled down if you didn't have a fridge." The basketball player was scratching his chin in thought. "And if you didn't have a fridge the thing wouldn't have been cooled down."

"Word."

Adrian's head popped out from the inner window of the kitchen. "Guys, the ice can't fit in the bottles, so I put mine in the fridge."

"Ohhh dude put mine in the fridge!" Jay held out his drink and the other guys did as well. Adrian took each and every one and went back into the kitchen while Jay was asking him something. "Why can't the ice fit in the bottle though?"

"Because the ice is too big for the bottle, so the bottle can't be cooled with ice." Was his simple reply.

James frowned. "So if the bottle was too small for the ice, then that means the ice can't cool the bottle down."

"That's why I'm putting them in the fridge so that they can cool down." Adrian returned and sat in his respective seat, between James and Jay. "I def' bought a fridge to make drinks cold, because a fridge is what you need to make drinks cold."

"Yes, and if you don't have a fridge, you can't have cold drinks." Zamasu was playing around with the pants of his jeans absentmindedly.

"That would suck bruh." Adrian shook his head. "Lemme tell you guys a story; this one time I was at the supermarket, and I saw this dude. And I only saw this dude because I was in the supermarket."

"Exactly." Jay nodded. "Because if you weren't in the supermarket, you wouldn't have seen that dude."

"Yeaaaah, I wouldn't have." Adrian was smiling.

Jay sat up. "And if that dude wasn't in the supermarket…"

"Then I wouldn't have been in the supermarket!" Adrian's smile got bigger at the revelation.

"Exactly!"

"That's crazy, dude." James shook his head.

"But then that means that he saw you because you were in the supermarket." Zamasu was gesturing as he spoke, pointing between Adrian and some other space. "And you saw him because… you were in the supermarket."

"Exaaaaactly, dude! That's that crazy shit bruh."

"Deadass, that's crazy dude." Jay shook his head.

"And that means that if you weren't in the supermarket, you would have never saw this man." The Kaioshin looked just as incredulous as the others.

"That's so true, but like I saw this dude, and he wanted to pop off on me because I was on the checkout line earlier than he was, and I wasn't supposed to be on the line at that time, and at that time I wasn't supposed to be on the line because that's… just not the time that I was supposed to be on the line, you feel me?" The guys were listening intently as Adrian told his story. "So, this dude, he just wanted to pop off because I was finna checkout, and because I was finna checkout he wanted to pop off."

"You shouldn't have been on that line, because you were on that line then that guy wouldn't have wanted to pop off." James added on, followed by Jay's 'deadass'.

"That's what I'm saying bro!"

"Yeah, and if you weren't in the supermarket, and if he wasn't in the supermarket, there would be nobody popping off on nobody." James said.

"Woooooow, dude I didn't even realize that though. But like, this dude wanted to pop off and try to me- but because I was in the supermarket, I got lucky. So I slipped through with a jab real quick and he fell, because I got lucky."

Zamasu nodded. "That's good though, if you didn't get lucky, then you wouldn't have jabbed him. And if you didn't jab him, then you didn't get lucky."

"Right!" Adrian looked at the green man. "Like it's all luck when it came down to it at the end of the day, because you need luck to be dealing with some people sometimes."

"Exactly and if you don't have no luck, then you can't be dealing with those people." James said, and everyone had gotten elated.

"I did not realize that!" Jay's eyes went wide. "Some people just get lucky because they in a right place, and when they in the right place then they get lucky. And they only got lucky because they're in the right place."

"If you're not in the right place, then you're not going to get lucky." If there was physical description for Zamasu's facial expression, it would be the same look a scientist has went they're deeply contemplating a newfound discovery. That goes for everyone within the living room at the moment.

"Yeah, I only got lucky because I was in the supermarket, and if I wasn't in the supermarket I wouldn't have gotten lucky and jabbed that dude. That's what's crazy though- like you said," Adrian gestured to James. "If it weren't that dude, I wouldn't have gotten lucky."

"And if it weren't for you being in the supermarket, and if that dude wasn't there, you two wouldn't have popped off and you wouldn't have gotten lucky to jab him." James held his head in his hands.

"Wooww! That's true!" Jay looked at the basketball player. "I didn't even think of that."

"That is crazy." Zamasu shook his head. "I wasn't even thinking about that, but you also have to think about that, you have to think about thinking about stuff."

"Exactly, you _have_ to think about stuff because if you not thinking, then you just don't have stuff to think about." Jay looked down at his lap shaking his head.

"Yeah, you need to think about thinking about stuff, because if you don't think about stuff then you're not gonna think about anything."

Zamasu exclaimed. "And you're never going to _amount_ to anything!"

"Exactly, exactly." James agreed.

"That's true." Jay replied.

"Woooow dude, that's crazy to think about man." Adrian scratched his chin. "You always gotta have time to think, because if you don't have time to think, then there's is no thinking time."

Jay looked between the dudes. "There's always a time to think bruh. Always. If you don't have the time to think, then you're not thinking."

James snapped his fingers. "Bruh that's what some people need to understand nowadays, because nowadays that's what people need to understand, because when you thinking nowadays there's always something that you gotta understand. And that's that some people don't understand shit."

"Exactly." Adrian nodded. "Because you're not thinking, so if you not thinking then you're not gonna understand shit."

Jay shrugged in agreement. "Exactly, there is just certain shit you won't understand if you're not thinking.

"That's what I'm talking about, that's exactly what I'm talking about, and people like to sleep on me with this shit. And when I sleep, I sleep and that's it, but if you sleep on me then I'ma sleep on you, and we both sleeping then we sleeping together."

"Deadass."

"And if we're sleeping together, then that means together we sleep." James looked down as Zamasu took hold of a coaster on the coffee table, and he nodded.

"Exactly, together we sleep."

"We're united as one." Zamasu added.

"And as one, we're united." Jay smirked, and the guys gave each other looks of epitome.

"Deadass, man." Adrian gave him a dap, their hands staying together as the other two joined in.

"Quadruple that shit, Quadruple it, because that's what you gotta graduple." Jay looked down at the four hands all joined together as he said.

"That true, because three plus one is four, and one plus three equals four." Adrian pointed at their hands, which were now released from the multi-dap. "And if you… three plus one, that equals four also."

"Ah, but then that also means that four is three plus one." Zamasu raised a finger.

"Yeah, exactly." Adrian nodded.

"Right, and four is deadass…" Jay started and then the four of them said at the same time. " _One plus three_."

"Exactly!" Zamasu exclaimed.

"Woooow, dude that's crazy..."

"That's what I'm talking about!" James said. "That's what I'm saying!"

Jay spoke. "And when you thinking, you gotta be smart. You gotta be thought-smart, that's the certain shit you gotta know."

"Exactly, because if you not thought smart, then you not smart in your thoughts." Adrian pointed outwards, gesturing.

Zamasu shrugged. "Why are you even in your thoughts if you're not smart? I reckon you have to be smart in order to understand your thoughts."

"Exactly!" Jay stood up to get something, while Adrian added on.

"And if you're not smart in your thoughts, then you're thoughts aren't smart."

Jay returned with a potted orchid, placing it on his lap and holding it with his hands. "Right, that's that shit you talking about, because when you're talking shit that's that shit you gotta talk about, you know." He then shrugged and scratched the bridge of his nose because it was itchy. "You just gotta _talk that shit_."

"Exactly." Adrian nodded. "Because if you not talking, then you're not talking shit."

"Yeah!"

"And if you're talking, you're definitely talking shit."

Jay smirked. "And if you're shitting, you talking."

"Wow." Zamasu was reclined against the sofa like the others in stupor. "That's something I didn't think about…"

"Yeah, same." James sat up. "And if you're shit talking to somebody else, then to somebody else you shit talking."

"And if you're weren't shit talking to somebody else, then nobody would hear you shit talk." Adrian looked at James.

"Yeah like- that's crazy. Like, this whole conversation is crazy dude. If we weren't having this conversation, then this conversation would be had."

"Oh man, deadass…" Jay smiled. "I'm happy to be talking with y'all right now in the living room. Like… if we weren't in the living room right now, we wouldn't be talking."

"If we weren't in this house, we wouldn't be talking at all." Zamasu's eyes were wide. "And if we weren't talking, then this conversation wouldn't have happened."

"That fucking crazy… all of that shit, just how much shit went down in order to come down to this." Adrian pointed at each and every one of the guys next to him. "None of this would have happened… if none of y'all were _here_. I wouldn't have been sitting on this couch with the three of you if you three weren't sitting with me right now."

"And since we sitting with you right now, and we talking right now, then the four of us are _talking_." James' head swayed with a nod, his gaze was downcast.

"Yeah, like all four of us in this one room… I would have been asking how it came down to this, but I know how now." Jay looked at James. "It's because we all here, right now, in this moment."

"And if we weren't here in this moment, this moment would have never happened dude!" James gave Jay that same agreeing look that every single of them had on their faces during this whole interval of what seemed like an hour.

"And if this moment had never happened, we wouldn't have thought about it!" Adrian shared the same look.

"And if we didn't think of it, then this moment would've never happened!" Zamasu chimed, and they all shared their 'wow's and their 'damn's along with daps and smiles.

"All of this is happening because we're all here. We all are living and we're thinking, and when we thinking, then we're all living." Jay's fingers were against his head as the smile on his face didn't falter.

Zamasu shared the same sentiment, except he was sitting up and articulating as he spoke. "Because if we're not thinking, then we're not understanding. And if we're not understanding, then we aren't thinking about anything."

"You always gotta be thinking in life, man." Adrian slowly arose in his seat along with Zamasu, sitting up just as much he was. "Because if you're not, then you ain't understanding anything. And to think is to understand, and to live is to think, so to life is to understand!"

The four males within the room had expressive looks on their face that went beyond verbal description, because each and every one of them were conveying the same exact thoughts and actions at nearly the exact time. It's like they knew what one was about to say, and still spoke their thoughts because they just _know_ they'd reply. Their words went from wondrous, to cognizant, and finally they were all making sense of one another's thoughts. This couldn't have taken place with any other person, with any other people, but these four. These words wouldn't be spoken at behest of anyone else but these four, because they were all in the same place. Their smiles were communicative, fully expressing their thoughts through the means of gratitude.

Zamasu's gaze went in different places as that statement waltzed through his mind; first the floor, then the table, and the wall, and then back to the floor again. "I know, I never even thought about it like that, but like that, I thought about it."

"Deadass, and I'ma give you guys a pound." Jay gave Zamasu a brofist, along with Adrian and James. "And I'ma give you guys a pound because I'm feeling you guys, and at the end of the day since I'm feelin' y'all, then a pound is what I'll give."

"Yeah, and since you feeling us, and we feeling you, then we all feeling each other." Adrian looked up at Jay as he stood.

"Bruh, that's true." James nodded. "We're all in this living room with the feels."

"And the feels are what we're with in the living room." Adrian nodded, and Jay kissed his teeth with a smirk.

" _Shiieeet_ , you guys wanna play some shit?"

"Sure." Zamasu nodded, and the other guys agreed. Surprisingly enough, they did have a semblance of awareness, just about enough to know that they still had the controllers out. And the guys were also holding random objects, James at one point got up and came back with a pineapple that was sitting on the kitchen countertop, and Adrian was keeping a pillow on his lap. Jay still had the potted plant and Zamasu wasn't holding the coaster anymore, he leveled up to a brush that he found sitting on one of the mounted shelves in the living room. It's fair to say that these guys knew what they doing, and they knew that the four of them were just about to get into playing something, and were fully conscious of what their plans were…

Right?

...

If you guess that they knew _what_ they were doing, and actually decided to turn on one of the game systems just to play some random game and pass time while they were still high, then you're wrong.

You're dead wrong. Like, _way off_ wrong.

They were upstairs in Adrian's large room. Adrian had the end of a spoon handle in his mouth. James had another spoon in the same fashion, edge of handle against his mouth. Jay was sitting on the bed, and Zamasu was sitting on the cloud chair, which is basically a fluffy beanbag-like chair that levitates above a silver conductive platform. The two spoon-clad men took turns booping each other on their heads with the spoon, while the bystanding producer watched along with the God, who was scheming something in his mind.

Okay, okay, your facepalm couldn't get _any_ harder than this, but there is a backstory behind the situation. They didn't play any video games, no, but when they turn on the TV, Tom and Jerry was still playing, and it was on a particular scene where Tom gets hit with a spoon. In their altered state of mind, that scene was _hilarious_ to them, enough to make them topple over in their seats cracking up over a simple spoon-bop. Yes, even _Zamasu_ laughed, like, he was on the floor laughing his Potara earring off. They didn't actually come off, he probably wouldn't even notice if they did though.

He probably would've thought they had an errand to run or something.

After their laughing raid, James proposed the genius idea that went along the lines of 'Bruh, you can make a game out of that'. That rouse brought them out of their laughter, they cascaded from giant smiles and hearty chuckles to wondrous looks. Apparently, it occurred to them that spoons weren't hard, nor would they injure a person that badly. And also, seeing someone get a spoon bop to the head was _fucking hilarious_.

Nobody thought they would take that seriously, though. Nobody could have thought that when the only people in Adrian's house right now were the four of them.

Zamasu stood up, and left the room without a word. At first, Jay frowned, but because weed speaks louder than physical cues, he went back to watching the two men bop one another's head with spoons. The Kaioshin came back with a spoon in hand whilst leaving the door open, and Jay looked up momentarily with a frown. Zamasu placed his finger to his lips, telling Jay not to say anything. He noiselessly sauntered behind James, who wasn't facing the door and therefore couldn't see the Kaioshin holding a spoon up. Adrian saw this, but Zamasu silently urged him to keep quiet, and without warning, he bopped James' head a bit harder with the spoon and retreated back out of the room.

The timing was perfect, for when it was Adrian's turn to bop James' head, Zamasu came in and bopped James' head, making it look like it was Adrian's doing.

With the fact that their spoon were on their mouths, their pops weren't even remotely close to hard. They weren't even proper _bops_ , matter of fact. So when Zamasu bopped James' head, it made him wince slightly and look at Adrian in confusion while the other was trying not crack up too hard. Jay pretty much fell back against the bed seeing James hold his head and Zamasu dash out of the room.

Adrian bent his head down for James to bop down, and he did so. When it was Adrian's turn, Zamasu slipped back into the room to bop James' head, making the basketball player wince and hold his head again.

"Ow!" James could barely get the word out clearly because umm… spoon in his mouth. So it sounded like a disgruntled wound, and Adrian was suppressing a telling laugh. Jay's mouth was pursed, but he was silently laughing as his face scrunched up from the hilarity.

The third time was exceptionally different. Since they were all high, Jay and Adrian couldn't help their stupid giggles at how Zamasu's smiling green head was poking out from Adrian's door opening. James was just as high as the others, so he just thought they were laughing at how hard Adrian can hit him in the head with the spoon that he was holding in his mouth.

He's partially correct on that, though.

Zamasu sauntered in again, creeping up slowly like a saucy burglar, and he held the spoon up as he did so. Once it was Adrian's turn again, he bopped James' head again and dashed towards the door with a chuckle as stupid as theirs. James held his head and started to look a little frustrated at Adrian, who looked like he'll laugh himself into an aneurysm.

"Fucking hell- switch with me! Switch spoons, now." Adrian took his out and wiped the handle of it and handed it to James while he did the same thing, because James was getting upset at how Adrian could bop him harder than he did. So in order to rectify that with his logic, they had to switch spoons because Adrian's spoon had a higher power level or something? And therefore switching would make James' hits stronger?

Power levels don't apply here, in this situation. This is Universe 10, not Universe 7.

They did switch, indeed. But that didn't solve James' problem. The basketball player, once Adrian bent his head down, literally held his way all the up to face the ceiling and back down in order to exact the same force that he had been receiving. The sight made Jay snort so loud that both guys paused to look at him, and when they paused it just made the reddened-faced Asian laugh harder. James' head was upwards while Adrian's was downwards, and they both had spoons in their mouths, for crying loud. How could this not get any better?

"Whuts hso fhunny?" James looked at Jay, and he shook his head multiple times.

"Nothing, nothin'- go on." Jay wiped the small tears that were coming to his eyes, and James went back to facing the ceiling and then whipping his head back down. James didn't have a good grip on the spoon though, so when he went down it hit Adrian's head and bounced onto his nose before falling to his lap.

Zamasu was watching this, and he pretty much fell to the floor laughing his ass off, dropping the spoon in plain for James to turn around and see. The basketball player saw the spoon on the floor near Zamasu and he turned to his lap only to see that his spoon wasn't right there. The spoon actually fell on his lap and landed on the couch, right below his lap. Since he was wearing joggers, he didn't actually see the spoon, so a quick jump to conclusion was made in his mind.

"How the fuck did you get my spoon?"

You're probably reading this, and asking… _what is the author on?_ Nothing.

Nothing but creativity. And it's vast than a motherfucker.

Adrian couldn't help himself any more. He could only tap James and point to the area of the couch where his lap was, and he did all did while speaking somewhat coherently mixed with cackles. James looked down, saying that his spoon wasn't there until he stood up and saw it. Zamasu quickly snatched the spoon again and stood back up while Jay hilariously motioned for him to continue on. James sat down, charged up his spoon bop attack again with better grip this time, and Adrian raised his head on his turn while laughing. Zamasu came in, but started laughing and fell to his knees before he could hit James in the head, and James turned around.

He dropped his spoon. "So _you_ were doing all this bullshit?!"

Zamasu was too busy laughing to answer immediately, his high-ass self couldn't help but find everything funny. That went for everyone else in the room, even James who was trying to look serious couldn't keep the smile from flickering on his face. He turned to the two music producers who had also lost it, even though they lost it a while ago. "You guys are dicks."

"Heyyy, listen." Jay sat back up from Adrian's bed, his samurai bun was kind of lopsided at the moment. "I didn't know he was doing that shi-" He started laughing again.

Adrian shook his head with the smile on his face. "I'm sorry bruh, you lost. I beat you."

There were _scores_ to this game. Yes, you could lose a spoon bop against someone, isn't that dandy.

"Nah, _I_ beat you! Th'fuck you talking about?" James sat back down in his seat with his spoon in hand.

"Fine, we'll rock, paper, scissors then." Adrian held out his hand and James eagerly grabbed it. "Best outta 4."

"You can't do best outta 4. That's an even number." James shook his head.

"Wait, you guys." Jay frowned. "You're doing rock, paper, scissors… not a thumb war."

He said that because James and Adrian were holding hands, as if they were about to do a thumb war. Adrian looked down, and James released his hand. They both did best out of 3, with James winning against Adrian.

"It's confirmed, I won!" James did this groovy thing in triumph, which honestly looked pretty good even though he was high.

"No you didn't. _I_ won." Zamasu pointed to himself, and this basically started some lengthy redundant argument between them about who won the spoon bop game. Nobody was even scorekeeping in the first place, how the heck could they determine a winner? Several minutes after their weird arguing, they all had calmed down and a silence passed through the room, followed by a yawn from Adrian.

"I'm tired."

And the other three could vouch for that sentiment, because they were all extremely exhausted. Sure, they didn't do anything else other than eat a bunch of food, talk about fridges, hit each other with spoons, and argue, but weed makes you darn tired. Even Zamasu was looking quite exhausted, and he stretched as if he had just sat for ten hours. At this point, everybody felt like their limbs weighed 592 pounds (and five hundred ninety two is correct because they calculated it. Don't ask) and could barely leave the room and come back if they tried. Jay decided that Adrian's bed was going to be his bed for the time being, he laid down where his friend's fresh pillows were and was already dozing off on his soft bed. Adrian found refuge on one of his couches, sleeping on his stomach, while James was already laying down on the other couch with his eyes clothes. Zamasu reclined back into the cloud chair, the fluffy material already inducing his sleepiness. You gotta keep in mind that this man had _nine_ _edibles,_ and one brownie is enough to get four guys high. So he technically had 36 full servings of delicious weed brownies. The four men individually laid comfortable, each and every single one of them sleeping soundly like babies.

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Last night, Lexi had called Jay's phone at _least_ seven times overnight. She didn't know where the guys were, and had she did the model would have went back to Adrian's house that night. During the time, she got a call from one of the main coordinators of her designated fashion show, he had told her that her arrival has to be pushed back an hour. It would make sense, she was flying out to a different country, complications of said runway were reasonable. Her plan was to fly either later on tomorrow, or early on the day after and she more than likely would take the earlier route because time zones were very different between her home country, Tycho, and Efilia, which is the country she has to fly to. By the time she would get there, it would be nighttime in that area, so she could just sleep normally since she's bound to be tired from the 6-hour flight.

Ashley had asked her if she was with the guys, and Lexi said no. Apparently Adrian's girlfriend was even trying to reach him but he also wasn't answering. She called James as well but he didn't answer, and if only Zamasu had a phone she probably would have gotten some word on their whereabouts. She saw Zamasu as someone who is very vigilant, so he would have been responsible enough to tell her where they were if he were given a phone, right?

She had to guess that they went somewhere, and left their phones at Adrian's house in the process. But if they did leave, they surely should be back as of now shouldn't they? It's 12:50 at night, even. She doubted Zamasu would want to stay out for so long because of how introverted he is. Rebecca even had to leave and go back home, saying that if Zamasu wanted to he would just fly or teleport back to her home. Ollie didn't seem to make any noise, he was remotely quieter than usual. And when Lexi came into her house, the pug was cuddling next to Loki in front of a book.

According the Rebecca, the Kaioshin's habits had rubbed off on her canine children. It's not like they could read either, they just did that on their own.

That was last night. Right now, it was a bit past 11 in the morning. Lexi was in her own house wearing nothing but a satin nightwear kimono, the same one that Jay had bought her recently. Rebecca called, saying that she had a friend with her about fifteen minutes ago, and she may drive to the model's house to pick her up. Lexi did tell her that she wanted to go to the guy's home, hopefully they were actually there now, in order to see what they're up to and also to smack her boyfriend for not answering her calls. It's reasonable.

Lexi lived in a big rustic contemporary. The front walls where the living room was had glass windows, and most of the interior floors and ceilings were polished wood. Her living room had textured, cream limestone veneer walls, and her kitchen had more woody tones about its walls as well. Her house wasn't on a hill like Shona's but her bedroom also had a glass wall so she had a sweet view of the plains and distant hills she was surrounded by.

She looked out of at the glass wall in her kitchen eating breakfast. She would have ate in the living room for a better view, but Jay had squashed that bad habit of hers. After the woman finished, she received a text from Rebecca saying that she was right outside, and the model had changed into a simple red batwing shirt and short pants.

The car ride was simple, Rebecca, her friend and she talked up a storm about random stuff. June was her name, the woman had pretty cheekbones that amplified her smiles, sweethearted-light blue eyes mint colored hair. June was also a xenoarchaeologist, one who particularly does research on extraterrestrial culture. She was a sweet person, her and Rebecca got along for that simple common trait. Rebecca was already driving to Adrian's place just in time to see Ashley's car go through the gates as well. The doctor quickly closed in the distance and entered before the gates could close, which caught the attention of Lexi, but since she actually needed to see them, she would let it slide.

Rebecca waited in the car, she asked June if she wanted to leave but June chose to stay since she didn't know the guys at all. Both Ashley and Lexi had the keys to the house respectively, so when they opened the door they were met with a relatively normal sight, except there were minor misplacements that raised questions between the women.

Why was Jay's potted plant sitting on the sofa? Why is there a pineapple in the living room? How come one of the coasters ended up in the kitchen, and _specifically_ only one? There were other things that Ashley had brought to her attention while she returned the pineapple to the kitchen.

"Why is the ice tray out?" Ashley pointed and Lexi frowned. The writer took it and opened the freezer, only to frown even more. "How come these bottles are upside down in the freezer? One of them is even open."

It was unlike either one of the two men to leave a drink in the freezer. They were much too keen to do that, even James knew this. And Zamasu probably wouldn't have touched these bottles on his own. Lexi went back into the living room. "They might be upstairs, Ash."

There was no sound in the house, both women paced upstairs and split up going into two guestrooms, only to find no one in either one of them. The last guestroom was empty as well, and Jay's room was also empty. Adrian's room was to the right and across from Jay's and the door was partially open. Lexi slowly opened it, to reveal the same four guys they haven't heard a word from since yesterday afternoon. They were all fast asleep; Jay was snuggly comfortable on Adrian's bed, Adrian's mouth was slightly parted and he was sleeping against a couch on his stomach, James had both hands resting behind his lopsided head on the other couch, and Zamasu's head was lolled back into the cloud chair with his mouth parted. All his limbs were hanging off the fluffy chair, and the levitating chair itself was rotating slightly. There were a few spoons littered about the place, and Adrian's phone was on the floor

They all looked _knocked out_. What _happened_ yesterday?

Lexi sighed and motioned to Adrian. "You get your man and Zamasu, I'll get mine." Ashley went to her boyfriend and Lexi didn't even waste time to sit on the side of the bed to calmly tap Jay. Instead, she pounced on him and said 'Hey' really loud while shaking him awake. Jay pretty much responded quickly, and when he saw that the person vigorously shaking him was his beloved girlfriend, he blinked and frowned.

"Lexi… what the fuck? I was sleeping." Jay stopped to stretch, and Lexi leaned back to sit below his stomach.

"I called you more than nine times yesterday, and you didn't even pick up _once_."

Jay sat up and rubbed his mouth. "Wait, what? You did?"

" _Yes._ "

She looked really annoyed, and Jay in his tired state couldn't help but apologize. "Hun, I'm sorry. I didn't know, I was asleep."

"Asleep at eight at night?" Her hands were on her hips. "You don't go to bed that early."

"What are you talking about?" It was his turn to frown now. "I slept mad late yesterday, you probably called me at a later time…" And then he blinked and looked around. "...wait… What time is it?"

"It's twelve fifteen."

"What the _fuck_?!" He exclaimed. "We slept for more than _sixteen hours?!_ " Apparently, the munchies had gotten to them a little too fast and a bit too heavy.

"Well, apparently." Lexi turned around to Ashley, who after tapping her boyfriend's arm, and then she impatiently slapped his butt to ruse him up.

Adrian groaned, already knowing who hit him despite just waking up. "Ugghhhh, _Ashleeeeeey,_ that's not cool…" She didn't even answer him, she went to Zamasu to tap him awake too. Luckily for her, Zamasu was shifting after a few taps. "Hey, hey, Zamasu. Wake up."

And he did. He opened his eyes slowly, greeted by a face that he also did not recognize until he realized this was Adrian's girlfriend in front of him. He raised his head upwards and looked around at the scene before him. Lexi was shaking James vigorously and the basketball player almost slapped her hands off of him before waking up fully.

"Rise and shine, boys." Lexi left his side and the two women stood back to see the guy each stretching and grumbling. Zamasu stood up and looked at the two women.

"Why did you wake us up?"

"Yeah, isn't it like… in the morning." Adrian stretched mid-sentence, and Ashley shook her head. It is also unlike both the music producers to sleep so late.

Ashley crossed her arms. "It's twelve in the afternoon."

"HUH?!" Adrian shot up and off the couch with a frown. "Are you serious?!" He looked to his holographic clock on his desk stand and was immediately greeted with seven missed calls, all from yesterday evening to last night. That holographic projector was connected to his phone, so he could see any notifications that would beam up on it. He slowly looked back at Ashley, who was giving him a very _cross_ look. "Baby, I'm sorry. I-we uh…"

"What happened?" Ashley shrugged in confusion. "I found a pineapple on the living room floor, you left the ice tray out, you put drinks in the fridge upside down, and there are spoons littered around this room."

Each and every one of the guys had remembered what went down, and they all mentally made it a pact to _not_ talk about it to these two women because the more they thought about it, the more retarded it sounded. The room was pretty filled with inconclusive 'umm's and 'uhh's, scratchings of heads, and lowkey guilty looks.

"I'll beat it out of all of you if you don't speak now, since you've got the both of us worried and shit." Lexi's hands on her hips as she took on a maternal timbre, and Zamasu frowned at her. She shot a frown back. " _Well?_ "

The Kaioshin stayed quiet and looked away from her, ain't no way _he_ would answer that question. Jay decided to break barriers, and his sight showed how high-key disappointed he was.

"We were eating… and we kinda forgot to put the spoons back."

Lexi tilted her head. "Says the guy who always eats in the dining room."

"Listen, okay… I did not feel like eating there yesterday." Jay explained.

"Exactly. We all just ate up here." James added in.

"He's right." Zamasu kept his voice affirmative, "They decided to eat up here on their own, that is all."

The women looked at each other. In their minds, they figured Zamasu was very responsible, so what he said was whatever went down. They wouldn't think that he would lie or anything, not that he totally wasn't lying to them right now, right?

Lexi looked at Jay for this one. "And that meant not answering your phones, you idiots?"

Jay stood up, and went to his girlfriend's side to hug her but she backed away with crossed arms. "Lex', I didn't have my phone on me at all. We were hanging out and we kinda forgot it. I'm sorry."

"Me too." Adrian looked down at the ground. "My phone is probably downstairs somewhere, I forgot it. My bad..."

Ashley sighed. She kinda had a soft side for her boyfriend, even though she calls him names a lot. But they're endearing names, and most of them are rather fitting, like _dork_. "Just... don't do that again. Zamasu's here, he's your witness."

Adrian, Jay and James shared a common thought while Zamasu looked up at his name being mentioned; _No he's not._

"Zamasu." Lexi looked at the green Kaioshin who looked at her. "Ollie and Loki wondered where you were yesterday. I guess you four have gotten well acquainted with one another, but next time could you answer one of their phones if they're too lazy to get it?"

"He doesn't know how to work a phone." Came Adrian's simple reply.

"Alright, then I'll show you one day." Lexi shrugged. The guys did mention that she ought to demonstrate how a phone works to him, so it's confirmed. She'll be his _mobile device mentor._

Ashley started towards the door. "You guys need to freshen up." She referred to her and Lexi. "We're gonna go out, and Rebecca and her friend are waiting in her car right now."

"Wait, she's here?" Jay fixed his shirt.

"Who's her friend?"

"A woman named June." Lexi looked at James. "They're both waiting right now, so you all should get ready." And with that they left Adrian's room leaving the guys to let out a sigh of relief.

Zamasu looked at each and every one of them. " _Never speak of what happened yesterday to anyone._ "

"Bruh, we won't." Adrian shook his head, and the other two agreed as well. That was their little secret, no one else needs to know that.

Zamasu left the room and went downstairs, giving the women a quick 'Good afternoon' before going to where his sneakers were. Lexi turned around to look at Zamasu. "Oh, I almost forgot. Rebecca wants you to go home."

Zamasu paused. "Why?"

"Remember those strawberries that you ate?"

"Oh, please." The Kaioshin rolled his eyes. "If she thinks I'm going to replant all of them, then she's crazy."

Lexi chuckled. "It wouldn't be hard for you, wouldn't it? Can't you just do that summon thingy so that you can create a bunch of strawberries instead?"

"I could." The Kaioshin stood up. "But… no."

"What summon thingy are you talking about?" Ashley frowned. "Is that an ability your species has?"

"He can create anything he wants." Lexi briefed.

"Really? Wow…" She looked shocked. "That's some god-tier shit right there."

"I _am_ a God." He declared, and nodded as Ashley's shock amplified. "Yes, my species _are_ the Gods of Creation."

" _Seriously_?" She blinked. "How do I know if you're not lying to me?" Zamasu held his hand out, and a handful of strawberries were created right before their eyes. He looked down at his hand and picked up one of the strawberries to eat it. Ashley slowly nodded. "Okay. I kinda believe you."

"Kind of?" Zamasu raised a brow, and before he could unleash his God Split Cut, the doorbell rang. He looked over to the door just as Lexi stood up to get it. When she passed by him, he smelled nothing but friggin' orangey fragrance.

 _Just his luck._

The door opened to reveal Rebecca. "Hey, Lex', umm… where's Zamasu?" She leaned to the side to see the Kaioshin standing quietly. "Hey, how come you didn't return?"

"I was with the men upstairs." He wasn't lying on that behalf.

"He had a lot of fun apparently." Lexi smiled, and Rebecca's car door opened. June stepped out and closed the door, then she looked at Rebecca.

"What's going on in there?" June approached the door, and Rebecca stepped into the house motioning for her to come in which she calmly denied. Lexi decided that since the woman was nice, she could come in, so without much push June finally gave in to the offer, stepping into the house. Zamasu had now moved away from the main hallway and was now standing in the living room, so he didn't get to see the new guest at first. Once Rebecca came into the living room, the woman she was with was in his full view.

The mint colored hair kind of threw him off, it contrasted greatly with Rebecca's red hair. As soon as June was in the living room, Ashley immediately bugged out.

"Wait… _THE_ June Mayerly?" Ashley pointed and looked at Lexi. "This is the friend you're talking about?"

"Yes…?" Lexi actually didn't know who she was.

Ashley looked at June, and gave her praise. "I've read all your works, you're one of my favorite writers of all time, like…!" She was ecstatic to see this woman in front of her and Lexi figured that June was also a writer. The model seriously did not know who she was.

"Thank you so much." June smiled humbly. "I really appreciate it." She turned just in time to make eye contact with Zamasu, who was on the far side of the living room. She stared, blinked, and tilted her head. "Who's he?"

Rebecca looked to where she pointed. "Oh, that one over there is Zamasu." She dismissively addressed him and smirked at the now irritated Kaioshin.

"Watch it." He raised an offended brow and a finger at her, and then looked at June. "Hello."

She gave him a wave with a sweet smile just in time for the guys to walk down and see Zamasu with the four women.

Jay frowned. "Umm, why is Rebecca in the hou-JUNE!"

Adrian stopped mid stride went he saw her too. "June Mayerly?!"

James exclaimed. "WHAT?!"

June smiled and giggled at the guys, and they started complimenting her on the works that she had done. Namely, an excellent movie based off of one of her books called _Galaxa_ , and it is actually a classic amongst the guys as it came out a good ten years ago. She gave them each a gratified 'thank you'.

"Galaxa?" Zamasu looked at the group. "I've seen that before."

"You have?" June turned to him, and he nodded.

"It was interesting."

"Thank you." Her humble giggle was cute, not to him of course, but in general.

"So like… what did you guys wake us up for, because we kind of have plans to go to some place." Adrian addressed the question all the men shared.

"Well, you guys were sleeping for too long, and I wanted to know why you all went MIA yesterday." Lexi shrugged.

Rebecca added in. "Zamasu, are you gonna join them?"

He looked between the four women and the three guys that he had just got high with. He lowkey chose the right decision. "Perhaps."

She blinked, not expecting the answer. "Alright."

"We out soon, you guys? June, it was nice meeting you- wait, did you all eat yet?" Adrian looked at everyone in the room. Some said yes, the guys said no. "Fine, I'll whip something up."

"There is a lot of people in here dude. Lemme help you." Jay followed Adrian to the kitchen and Ashley felt compelled to help the two guys so she joined them as well. Everyone else pretty much got situated, it was a simple breakfast amongst the bunch and the guys got well acquainted with June. She, being an xenoarchaeologist, was very interested in learning about where Zamasu was from.

"The Kaishin planet."

"Oooh, I've never been on that one."

"It's separate from this universe. It's in it's own realm."

"Really? Interesting…"

That conversation could have went on for hours, because she wanted to know more than that. She asked what they studied, how their life was like, and how he learned to speak human language proficiently. Learning that their species was omni-sighted, June had less of a shock than the others. Even if she'd never seen such a species before, she didn't get wowed by his explanations. It just pulled her interest.

After they had finished, the women were on their way to leaving. Lexi had said her goodbyes to everyone because she was leaving the country soon. She gave everyone a hug, including Zamasu who obviously didn't mind, and Rebecca offered to drive her back home, and for June to chill with her. Ashley kissed her boyfriend goodbye, and then immediately gave him semi-hard smack on his cheek.

"Umm… why?"

"You need it." Was all she said, before she supplemented it with another kiss, and left his house. He shook his head and scoffed with a smile, because Ashley's cute when she's annoyed with him. This time, it was Adrian who offered to drive the guys out to where they were bound to go. They agreed upon this place for their own entertainment, but since Zamasu wanted to join in they may have to do some explaining, and that particular place was Ross' Gunnery.

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From Adrian's house to Ross' Gunnery is about a forty seven minute drive, the highway was pretty clear today, but that's because it was the last day of the weekend. Ross' Gunnery was a large, versatile shooting range in Southeastern East City, it had both indoor and outdoor shooting ranges for various guns and other ballistic weapons, like crossbows and arrows. It's actually one of the most popular gun ranges in the country since it offered things like TTR (Tactical Target Runs), Simulatrums room, and even paintball or laser tag. The Simulatrum is a bit different; because the targets are literal holograms, a specialized gun would be given to whoever was in there and they'd have to shoot at the holograms with it. The rooms were either open, or maze-like. TTP is where you would enter a room, and you'd have to run through till the end shooting at all targets with the best time. There were levels of tiers, tier one being the lowest, and tier four being the highest. One of the things that they lowkey wanted to do was beat the highest score, which was 47 seconds, and mind you that was on the biggest, most difficult map in that place yet.

The gun range was just about several miles away from South City, the most tech-savvy city in Tycho. It's the same place where K. Greinhardt was in, pretty much the best of the best were situated in South City. West City was more urbanlike than the rest, and East City is mostly suburban. North City is pretty much where all the rich people live, there are nothing but mansions there. Rebecca lived there, just around the edge of North City and pretty close to the east.

When they arrived, Zamasu didn't realize how _big_ this place actually was. They pretty much drove around a bunch of plains and some areas with crates and things like that to get to the entrance, and Adrian had just told him that all of that was a part of this gun range. They stepped in, the three famous men gave their hellos and their gratitude as expected, and went to one of the range station on the second floor. The elevator had glass walls so you could see as you made your way up. Ross' Gunnery was only three floors; including the floor below ground level. The particular station was S-7, which had four separate ranges each suitable for groups of four.

Zamasu looked down at the arsenal box, and then at the front table facing where the targets were. There were four pistols on the table, and he didn't know what the heck they were and how the heck one uses them. Adrian saw the obvious confusion in his eyes.

"You need help, don't you?"

Zamasu touched the pistol, and looked back at Adrian who was already wearing ear muffs. He was about to speak, but the muffled sounds of pistols going off interrupted him. After the racket, he spoke. "Isn't this the same weapon humans kill each other with?"

"Only the shitty ones." Adrian took one of the pistols and went into the arsenal box to reload it. Zamasu watched the last clip fall to his hand, and him inserting another. He frowned. "How does that even work?"

"Simple. You cock," Adrian cocked the pistol, and pointed it at a target. "You aim," and then his finger went to where the trigger was. "And then ya shoot."

It went off within a punchy bag, and Zamasu winced as his sensitive ears moved from the sound. "Oh shit, I forgot." Adrian took one of the muffs and handed them to him. "Here, put this on."

Zamasu did, and he took hold of one of the pistol, seeing how light it was in his hand. But it still confused him as to how something so small could make such a loud noise, so he tried looking into it. "What even comes out of this thing…"

Adrian had just finished reloading. He hadn't even looked away for a full minute, turning back to Zamasu and was greeted by the sight of the intelligent God of Creation staring into the chamber of a pistol.

"ZAMAS-" Adrian held the gun, pushing it away from his face and moving it to where it's supposed to be. "DON'T. DO THAT. Point the fucking gun at the targets, _god dammit_."

Zamasu frowned. "Excuse you?"

Adrian sighed, exasperated at how dangerous that whole ordeal could have been. "Fine, _turtle dammit_. I don't fucking know, just… don't do that. Ever."

"Alright then, fine." The Kaioshin was taught how to hold the gun by Adrian, who told him that he should use two hands instead of one because this is his first time. His first shot was obviously _way off,_ so much so that it ended up hitting the bulletproof wall of the target range.

"It's cool. Just dust yourself off, and try it again." Adrian smiled.

"Why do I need to dust myself off?"

The smile was quickly replaced with a sigh. "I didn't mean it literally, it was just a figure of speech."

Zamasu got the hang of it pretty well within a good five minutes. His aim went from haywire crosshairs to somewhat decent, and in fact he was getting a little bit of a kick out of this. The guys had dialogue running around with one another while they shot at either paper or concrete targets. The target rooms were actually separated by bulletproof glass so you could see how the other people were faring in their shots. This only applied to S-6 and above, the others were separated by opaque walls. While Zamasu was busy practicing his shooting, the three guys slowly diverted their attention to the target range next to theirs.

Whatever group was in S-8 was taking down the targets _extremely fast_ , it was almost aesthetic to see how smooth these people's _shooting_ was. Even the guy at the main gunsmith counter was looking, and he was on the farther side behind all of the stations.

"Yo, how is these people _synchronizing_ their shots, man?" Adrian stared in shock. "I lowkey wanna see who they are."

"It's like they're consecutively shooting on cue." Jay shook his head in amazement. "We need that kind of coordination." The shooting then stopped after a short while, and the guys curiosity was poked even further.

"I'm gonna ask K." James turned around to look at the gunsmith counter. "'Ey, K!"

K was the gunsmith man who took care of any possible conflicts with the firearms, and also was basically the customer service in the gun range, but pretty much everyone who came here often was well acquainted with K. He was tall, but shorter than James, and was more chubby than stocky. The guy had a well groomed long beard and bunned mid-length hair. K looked at James, and went over to their station, giving James a sweet dap because he knew the basketball player. "Yeah, what's up?"

"Who are the people in Station 8?" He asked.

"Yeah, they got mad skills." Jay removed his earmuffs, wearing them around his neck. It's a music producer habit.

"Oh no, it's not a group. It's only one person."

" _One_ person shooting _that_ fast?" James' mouth was parted.

"Yeah, that's why I was looking. She's the same person who landed the best time in Tier Four TTR."

"SHE?!" All three of them exclaimed. Not because the idea of a girl shooting very well is unheard of in their world, but because now they're all intrigued to see who this girl happened to be.

"Yup, the one who got 47 seconds." K nodded, and he looked behind him to see the person they talking about looking over at the gunsmith counter. She then looked around and quickly found him with four other males.

This woman had long jet black hair with slightly tanned skin. Her eyebrows were arched naturally, and her eyes were a mystic dark brown. She was about the same height as Lexi, and was wearing a v-neck white shirt with black jeans and slightly heeled gray boots. The guys, save for K and kind of Zamasu, just blinked; she was _very_ pretty.

Zamasu stopped shooting when he picked up something very peculiar, and it had nothing to do with the fact that his male acquaintances stopped shooting. The Kaioshin placed the pistol down; he was sensing something, and he didn't know if it was ki or not. Usually, humans have such a low energetic vibe that it cannot be felt by him, but he was somehow picking up something from behind him. He turned around to see the guys just staring at this woman while she was talking to K. He leaned forward at the men in stupor and looked at the pretty woman, who just left K after he answered her question. He wasn't paying attention to what they were paying attention to, so he had no idea why they looked so shocked.

James looked to K. "You know her name?"

"How do you not know her name, if you know who has the best time?" K frowned.

"I only know the best time, I didn't know who placed it."

K sighed. "Fair enough. Her name is Nousha."

 _That is a very unique name_ , Zamasu thought. He was looking at this woman as she spoke with a few other women who had left their stations and just came up to Nousha with attracted smiles on their faces. There was something… different about this woman, he didn't know how to explain it other than comparing her with the other four females he knew so far. Irene was boisterous, Rebecca was quiet and reserved, Ashley was comical, and Lexi exercised beautiful femininity, but _this_ woman had a gusto that he'd never seen before. She wasn't arrogant or anything, she just had that… that _smoothness_ , that's all he could possibly call it, and it was enough to make those three random women come up to her to speak. But the way she presented herself seemed so _effortless_ , like she was just breathing out suaveness.

He hadn't heard her voice, and he probably imagined it to be close to Lexi's because even though Lexi was straight up beautiful, this woman rivaled that with her body language. The Kaioshin watched as she went back into her station, and he looked over to Jay and Adrian who were talking about something else.

Perhaps the same energy he's getting from this woman is attracting other people towards her. It wasn't something ominous either, it was rather… mysterious.

The guys had their fill of learning the gist of who she was, they only knew her name and how she looked and that's it, and they went about their day. Zamasu, on the other hand, was watching her movements. It was weird; he was party doing this because he's trying to figure out if that spark of _whatever he sensed_ came from her, and also because she just intrigued him.

If curiosity could kill a cat, it could tickle a God to embark on things he never thought of doing.

You ever had to supervise a child in a large place, and when you turn around for one second and look back, they're gone? While the guys chatted leisurely, Zamasu pretty much slipped his way out of the station without alarming any of the three. She came back out again, walking towards one of these smart vending machines. It pops out a cup in a closed compartment and fills it up with whatever juice or juices you'd put in it. After it was done, a cap was placed over it and the drink if finally conveyed out of the compartment. While her back was towards him, he walked towards her and the vending machine and didn't hesitate in initiating dialogue.

"Hello there."

Nousha looked forward from watching the cup being filled with one of her favorite beverages because all she heard was this _proper male voice_ behind her. This is a shooting range, when do you ever hear anyone speak with so much elegant in a _shooting range_? The woman turned around, and blinked and cocked her neck back when she saw this tall, green man looking down at her.

"Uhh… hi?" Her simple response actually caught him by surprise, because her eyes weren't actually fully brown. Under this particular lighting they were in, Nousha's eyes were a beautiful gradience of brown and gray. Her eyelashes were thick, but they were naturally like that. In fact, she wasn't even wearing any makeup at all. Not only that, her voice sounded _much_ more different than what he had perceived. He did think her voice resembled Lexi's, and it sort of did, but it was different. Nousha's voice was more husky than sweet, but her voice was very _pleasant_ to the ear.

And apparently, Zamasu also didn't know how to normally greet people without both looking like Buddha's ex-maitre'd and outright saying 'You have something that intrigues me, I'd like to see it with my own eyes'. So he settled for something more traversed. "You are Nousha, are you not?"

She frowned and blinked. Was she in some sort of trouble? With green alien guys? "Umm, yes..." Nousha stood a bit straighter. "Is there something wrong?"

"Not at all." At least he had the common decency to answer that, because the way he approached her made it look like she had some underhand business going on with him. "I was in one of the stations next to yours and a rather… interesting display caught my attention. You have exceptional skill."

This is coming from somebody who looked into a pistol's chamber trying to see what comes out of it. But you can't blame him, it's his _first time_.

Nousha quirked a smile. Her smile looked pretty. "You were in one of the stations next to me?" He nodded, and she raised her head a bit higher. "Ohh, well… thanks." A short chuckle came from her lips, and she looked back at him with a questioning look, gesturing from him to her with both of her hands. "Have we met or something?"

"No we haven't." He shook his head. "But I have heard of you. I'd like to see your little… gun acrobatics."

He didn't have another word for it, and his terminology made her frown with a smile. There were several times in her life where those who caught sight of her would ask to see her spin or draw or perform a trick shot, and usually these people always sparked up a short conversation when they did so. This dude in front of her came up to her and legit said 'Hi, I know you, let me see a demonstration of your skills'. She looked over at her dispensed cold drink, and looked back at him. "You wanna watch?"

He nodded. Zamasu was doing this out of curiosity, he simply wanted to see what this was all about on his own. Nousha looked to the left in thought, he noticed that where her eyes were made the gray-gradient decrease due to the change in how light was being reflected from her eyes. And then nonchalantly, she shrugged in front of the God.

"Alright." Nousha nodded, and decided that if he wanted to see her pull through a few rounds, then she might as well have fun with it. "Lemme go get my guns. You can come into my station and see, by the way."

Zamasu nodded and pretty much watched as this fit woman went into her station's arsenal. She had a sleek gait, ubiquitously attractive to both sexes. No, he wasn't staring at her inappropriately, for any man her walk would be enough to beckon them into following her trail. But that doesn't matter because he doesn't like human women.

Does he even like _anything_? He himself didn't even know what _his own_ preferences were and thinking about it made him both uncomfortable and confused.

He followed her in and saw her equipped with two silver-stainless steel revolvers. These particular revolvers had eight rounds within a chamber, and the bullets were meant for sharpshooting so they had to be smaller than normal, both revolvers were in her black compact holsters on either side of her hips. Coupled with the outfit she had on, this entire getup looked badass, but since Zamasu didn't know what badassery meant, he just tilted her head at her entirely. K, walking to the ninth station next to hers, called her name and she turned around.

"You need an augment?" The types of revolvers she was using offered augments, whether it be increasing the fire rate, or decreasing the recoil, or whatever they allot for this type of gun. Usually, people who want to shoot very fast or not want to deal with recoil use augments, but Nousha ain't about any of that.

"Nope." She shook her head, and smiled down at the sweet stell babies, running through the chamber with a quick reload that caught the eyes of Zamasu. "I'm cool. Besides, this will only take a quick minute..."

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Public Service Announcement: Do not give weed to a God. Do not let said God find your weed being covert brownies. Do not leave said brownies with said God, or else said God will get super high.**

 **I think they're conversation while being high was probably the most uplifting things in the last few chapters, and in the most simplistic way possible. But let's take a moment to realize that they played a game involving** _ **spoons**_ **…**

 **That is for those of you who think entertainment can't come from** _ **anything.**_

 **It's funny if you think about it though, they got into an argument with some extremely religious lady, and ended up getting high with a God.** _ **Checkmate on her ass, hoe**_ **.**

 **I am so sorry… for the cliffhanger once again. By the way, expect a few other new characters, because Nousha and Zamasu meeting might be a breaker for the future, aka possibly the next chapter and more to come.**


	22. Trespassed

**Guess what? School started for me today.**

 **Guest what else? That is enough for these compact chapters.**

 **I would like to say that the last two chapters, as long as they were, are mere** _ **exceptions**_ **. There was so much going on and so many little things that couldn't be condensed, however it was getting long-winded. Between you and me, both chapters combined were** _ **77 fucking pages in 11-sized font**_ **. That's a very annoyingly long amount of pages, and the story needed it for a** _ **moment**_ **, but now the content will be shorter like it was previously.**

 **And also, this was made before chapter 21 was published, and I** _ **do**_ **want to say that I did debate on publishing the last chapter. It was getting quite fun to write, but it was also taxing to the story as a whole, since the events of some of 19, 20, and the first part of 21 happened in one day. It's kinda coincidental that a review even mirrored some of the same sentiment as I did, and I don't blame that person for it at all :). The story won't drag like this, things are going to get fast paced, and less… stupid.**

 **And by the way this is a quicker upload than usual, so that means you'll be waiting a bit longer for the next chapter. Just… just putting that out here :3**

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 **Trespassed**

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Zamasu watched as Nousha pressed a fews buttons on the screen against her table. There were certain protocols you could put in that allowed you to change the difficulty and the speed at which the targets pop up. Simultaneously, she was casually _spinning_ one of the revolvers in her hand as the six targets quickly rose upwards. She didn't even pull out the second revolver, she just had one in hand, and without any hesitation nor primary aiming, she shot at the six targets in less than two seconds. Then, a moving target from the side of the target room came down from the corner, and she shot at it from her hip. A second target was rapidly propelled up into the air and she shot it before it was even three feet above the backstopped floor. Her right hand went into a pocket in the holster while she spun the revolver in her hand, twirling it around a finger and parallel to her open palm before reloading.

All of this was done before the second batch of targets came up, which takes a mere couple seconds. There were four targets in front of the two, and they were moving horizontally this time. Without any hitch, she draw clocked fast enough to hit all four targets in less than _one second_. There was a timer above their station, which showed the time from the first shot to the last target killed; it read .67 seconds. New targets popped up much quicker, and she shot them down with the single revolver. All the while, she refilled the revolver's chamber within a second and clock three quick consecutive shots at three _flying_ targets.

Zamasu was just… you know what, shocked is an understatement. Nousha wasn't trying to show off, she wasn't looking for compliments at all and he could see that from the way she was casually flipping, spinning and shooting as if this was a simple hobby like… coloring, or something. It was a _mesmerizing_ sight to see, from the actual skill, to her genuinely doing all this because she enjoyed it.

He personally had never witnessed such _finesse_ by _anyone_ in his _entire life_. The closest thing that was as fluid as Nousha's movements was him making himself tea. Not because tea is liquid, but because when he does make tea he doesn't need to think in procedure, it's all second nature to him. That's what this woman was exercising right in front of him, but the amount of things that she was doing without any thought was outstanding.

The full target practice was five waves of different types of targets, each wave takes a good ten to fifteen seconds to complete if you're really good. So in total an expert would spend a whole minute or two doing this. Nousha completed the whole thing in _twenty eight seconds_.

"Done." She spun the revolver around her index finger and habitually threw it up and seemingly caught with her finger to spin it horizontally, before sliding it back into its holster. Nousha looked at Zamasu, who pretty much had his jaw dropped looking at her.

He blinked, before shaking his head. "Wow…" The Kaioshin was _actually_ stupefied. He couldn't even try to belittle or water down her gun prowess, it was just that magnificent. "How long... does it take to cultivate this skill?"

Nousha had her hands resting against the hilts of her revolvers leisurely. "I got into this stuff like a decade ago. Didn't really start doing much for the first few years though."

Zamasu tilted his head. _You mean to tell me,_ he thought, _that this woman finessed her skills in less than ten years?_ There are humans with _that_ much aptitude? There were indeed, like Lexi for example. But from the twenty or so minutes he spent looking, inspecting, and shooting a pistol, he couldn't imagine someone being able to aim so proficiently and perform such acrobatics with a gun. Guns themselves just looked weird to him, and they weren't necessary because he was a God, but this serves as him learning more about humans, doesn't it?

Not like he actually _wants_ to, honestly. He doesn't care about humans enough to _learn_ about them, we've been through this already.

"Ten years?" He frowned, she must have been exposed to this when she was young. Nousha looked like she was in the same age range as Rebecca and Irene, except younger. If he could be more specific, perhaps in her earliest 20s. "You held guns as a child?" Zamasu imagined that children would ought to be kept _away_ from these kinds of gadgets.

His question made Nousha chuckle, and she shook her head. "Nah dude, I was like 25 at the time."

 _What_? " _Twenty five?_ " That meant that Nousha's current age was 35. He looked her over; she did _not_ look like she was in her thirties, mind you right in her _mid_ -thirties.

"Yep." Nousha nodded. "Why?"

"You don't look like a thirty five year old."

She smirked. "That's flattering." Nousha unequipped her revolvers, placing them down on the table. "Thanks." Zamasu blinked, he gotten used to nonchalance with the guys, but this woman didn't even bat a weird eye at him. Not only that, she was speaking so casually with him that he felt the tiniest urge to assert that he wasn't just some regular being. At the same time though, he also didn't want to do that.

It was weird.

"What do you do with this skill of yours?" He wanted to know, because if this woman went around killing humans, he would have to punch her neck in.

Nousha shrugged. "For shooting? Not that much, but I specialize in firearms. A.K.A, I'm a gunsmith." Zamasu frowned, and Nousha blinked casually. "You don't know what that means."

It wasn't even a question, but Zamasu shook his head.

"Okay; I make and customize guns. Simple as that."

Zamasu nodded in understanding. And then his brows furrowed. "So… you make these weapons for people to use on one another?"

Nousha raised a brow. "No…" She placed her hand on her hip. "Most people who buy guns use them for domestic self defense, and every gun allotted to the public is only capable of stunning or tranquilizing someone."

"And that doesn't kill them?"

"Nah. It just kinda leaves them immobilized long enough for the cops to show up. Ain't no killing around here."

"So how come I've seen your species kill each other with it?"

"Criminals do that shit." Her nonchalance sort of made him frown. "They get guns illegally, remove all the tranqs, and somehow augment the bullets so that they can kill people." She then shook her head. "That is a long story, though."

"I have all day." Zamasu went over to where the table was and leaned against it with his hands folded on his lap. "I'd like to hear about it."

Nousha blinked. "Alright. So basically, a long time ago- well, a good two or so decades ago- many of the early blueprints of military guns were leaked, so a bunch of criminals have gotten hold of them before the blueprints could be deleted completely, and they started making their own guns from them. Gun crimes kinda surged and then decreased afterwards, because their guns were kinda defunct, and they couldn't fully replicate the powerful military weapons until recently."

"How recent?"

"'Few years until now' recent." Nousha said. "Like ya know, black vans and shit." He even forgot about those. "You heard about them?"

"I have." Zamasu nodded.

Nousha nodded, and sat next to him with a sigh. "Yup, they're annoying."

Zamasu almost chuckled at how nonchalant she sounded when she said that. As if a bunch of well-armed, dangerous suspicious looking vans were nothing more than a nuisance. She seemed to have her pride in the right place, Zamasu would be _willing_ to say that she would take anyone down with ease if they tried to hurt her. "They are. Running around doing petty crimes. If I cared enough, I would have smite them."

"You would have?" She frowned.

"... _Yes._ " Zamasu looked offended at the way she looked at him. "Why are you questioning that?"

"I dunno, you don't… look like somebody whose- no offense whatsoever, man." She raised her hands. "You don't look like somebody who'd fight."

"Is that so?" He narrowed his eyes in a smirk. Usually he would have been annoyed and would have insulted her for taking him so lightly, _usually_. "It is rather pertinent for my kind to learn how to fight. We are Gods, matter of fact."

"Wo-wait what?" She blinked. "You're a God? How the heck are you even here then?"

"We can exists amongst you humans, you know." Zamasu looked at her. "I don't know why anyone would want to do that anyway."

"I think you would."

"And what makes you think that?"

"Because you're _here._ " She laughed, and Zamasu rolled her eyes.

"It wasn't _my_ choice. My mentor appointed me here." Zamasu looked down at the ground.

"You Gods got mentors?" She raised her brows.

"I do. He's been around much longer, and he's getting old. So he made me his apprentice."

"Ooh." She nodded in some type of way, and Zamasu furrowed his brows.

"You don't believe me, don't you?"

" _Kind of not really._ " She smiled. "I thought you were some intelligent alien being, that's what I felt. Unless if you can heal the scratch on my forearm, I find it a little sketchy."

Zamasu quietly took hold of both her forearms, seeing the left one had a scar that started in the middle of her inner forearm, and ended below her inner elbow. The scar itself wasn't a _scratch_ , the skin around it was a bit darker than the surrounding skin, indicating a burn of some sort. He didn't even raise a full hand, he just had his finger up, and the scratch on her forearm was painlessly healed. Nousha blinked, and then she looked at him. "Well, shit."

" _Exactly."_ Zamasu released her arm. Her reaction was amusing.

Nousha looked down at her arm. A smile overcame her features for a moment, which intrigued Zamasu. But then she narrowed her eyes, she was testing him. "But how do I know you're not just some alien with healing powers, hmm?"

This was the first time someone had openly challenged him into proving that he was a God. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath with a normal sigh. But then he noticed Nousha went quiet. "What?"

"...You may not be lying." Brown-gray eyes gave him a look before her gaze went to the table. There was nothing physically showing on Zamasu, but the Kaioshin was now more shocked than anything.

" _You_ can _sense_ my ki?" Did she even know what ki was?

"No really that." _So she does know what that is._ "I just kinda felt like a uhh… thing on you. I can't explain it without sounding crazy."

"You are highly intuitive." He blinked. _This woman is something else_. "No human would be able to feel such high energy ki."

She chuckled. "I mean, intuition is one of the things that I'm big on."

Zamasu was compelled to ask her about her about her forearm. "Where did you get the scar?"

She looked down at her healed arm. "... I sometimes hate cooking."

"And you burned yourself?"

"Yeah. It wasn't fun."

"What kind of cookware were you even using to get such a wound like that?"

"A very hot pan, and a very hot spatula." Nousha shook her head, she spoke with authenticity, so her amusing story couldn't be a lie to him. "Maybe next time I burn myself, I ought to call you to heal it for me."

Zamasu chuckled. "Don't push your luck. I'm not your personal doctor."

"You don't have to beeee." She sing-songed, and it reminded him of Irene, except less annoying and less stupid. "You know, since you're a _God_ and all."

"You really think I'm joking, don't you?"

Nousha shrugged. "Even if you have a high vibration, you could just be some superintelligent green guy."

She wasn't wrong about that, but that's not the case. "One day, I will lift you and throw you across a room. With my mind."

"Wouldn't I get hurt?"

"That doesn't matter to me."

"But Gods aren't violent." She said, and he sort of went silent. Then, Nousha pointed at him with a giant smile. "A-HA!"

Zamasu stammered. "A-you… Shut up."

Nousha laughed. "I mean 'ey, there's nothing wrong with not being one."

"But I am one."

"Then you must be a violent God. That's not a good thing." She shook her head playfully. "Tsk tsk…"

Zamasu scoffed. "I haven't done anything yet, woman."

" _Yet."_ Once again, she checked him, raising her finger and wagging it.

Zamasu looked annoyed. "Just-... _ugh._ "

Nousha smiled. "I'm just fucking with you. Besides, if you're gonna prove your _godliness_ , Imma need some evidence."

"I might _just_ give you enough evidence."

"Well I mean, it'd be best to do all that outside of a public place." Nousha said.

"That's fine by me." He spoke with narrowed eyes and a frown.

"Oh, _really_?" She getting just as amped up as he was. "Then how about the Greenyard?"

"The what?"

"It's a place outside of the cities. It's pretty large, and no one lives anywhere near there."

"That's fine by me."

"Alright then. If I drive you out there, and you just fart out a dust puff, then I'd be very upset."

"You'll get _more_ than a dust puff, _human_." Zamasu's solidified his statement with a curt narrowing of his eyes. And that was that, the Kaioshin and the woman looked away from each other for a moment, a pause commencing between them.

And then, Nousha blinked and look back at him. "...Are we gonna actually do this?"

"I wasn't thinking of doing so." Zamasu looked at her. "But you're too stubborn."

"Nah, I'm just inquisitive." She gave him a toothy smile and got up from the table. "And kinda interested. I wanna see what you gotta show me."

"I would _gladly_ show you my divine prowess." He wasn't joking around, either. This was… something else, when was the last time he was this comfortable with a _complete stranger_?

Oh. Right, _never._

"Zamasu!"

Zamasu saw Jay walk past S-8, and stopped when he saw the green Kaioshin leaning against the station table. The producer turned to the left to address someone. "Fucki- I told you he was close to us!"

Said person was actually Adrian, and he peeked over to look. "Zamasu, we've been _looking_ for you dude. We're about to leave- and hi."

Adrian stopped mid-sentence to wave at Nousha and she gave him a 'Hey' back in somewhat of shock. She knew who they were, the two producers were famous, to catch them here was a rarity for her.

"I'm coming along." Was Zamasu's simple reply.

"Alright." Jay nodded. "We're gonna get James. Just come to our stations when you're done." And with that, he apologized to Nousha and then greeted her, which she smiled and greeted back, and the two of them left. Nousha looked at the men and then at Zamasu. "Welp, I guess you gotta go. Do you have a phone?"

"A-" He was about to ask what that was. "Oh. No."

"Then how the heck are you gonna contact me?"

"I'll teleport to you."

"You can teleport too?" Her eyes were raised.

"I am a _God_. What do you expect?" He stood and started towards the outside of her station.

"If you're a God, I shouldn't expect anything from you." She winked, thick lashes fluttering beautifully, and Zamasu frowned at her saying, but did not rebuke. "I know your friends have phones, definitely. So I'll just give you my number, you know… so that you don't end teleporting into a wall."

The _nerve_ of this woman. Zamasu shook his head, but he wasn't mad at her. She gave off a vibe that he could actually _coexist with_ without having to complain about how annoying and stupid she is. Yes, that was shade. Nousha pulled out her phone, but nothing to write with, and she showed him her number.

17-4894-876-22

Zmasu raised a brow at the eleven digits in front of him. "Shouldn't I write this down or something?"

"Don't Gods have good memory?"

He blinked hecka long at her. "You know what… _okay_. I have your number in my head, and _no_. We have _impeccable_ memory. Better than you humans."

"Ooh, that's nice... I'll see it when you actually call me." Her phone was placed back in her pocket, and waved at him. "Bye bye!"

He promptly bid her farewell, and when to S-7, where the guys _should_ be. But when he looked in, they weren't there. His eyes went to where K was, and a little bit behind the man was the three men standing and talking about something. Zamasu blinked, but still went to where they were. When he walked up, all he did was say 'Hello', and they were out just like that. Sometime during the car ride, they gave him really suspect looking smirks.

"What?" The obvious word that might as well be his damn catchphrase because _how many times_ has he said that over the course of four months? More times than he could count.

"What'd you talk about?" Jay smirked at him. He was sitting in the front seat next to Adrian, and James and Zamasu were sitting in the back.

What _did_ they talk about? "Things." Was all he said, not that he couldn't remember what she told him, but they're conversation was so _out of nowhere_ that he literally had no other words to describe it.

"Things?" Adrian asked, keeping his eyes on the road.

"What things?" James' smirk made his eye twitch, because it was screaming 'you tried something with her didn't you' and Zamasu would never, in his long life, _ever_ try anything romantic with a human. Even Lexi…

The Kaioshin refused to dwell on that possibility. _Nope_. "Guns, and… stuff."

For someone with an incredibly large vocabulary, he could have came up something more elaborate, but that's all he could say. _Genius_.

The guys couldn't pry anything out of him, because they realized that Zamasu was unintentionally tight-lipped on the situation and naturally could not say much. Adrian shrugged. "Well, alright then. Oh, and Zamasu… Rebecca wants you to go home."

Like the Kaishin realm, or her house? He knew the obvious answer, but he was being a little spiteful. "Really?"

"Mm-hmm. She called Jay while you tryna spit game."

What the heck does that even mean? "Spit… game? How do you spit a game? I was even spitting games."

The guys collectively sighed _again_ , while the Kaioshin looked really confused. So James explained. "When you 'spit game', you're trying to get the attention of someone you like, A.K.A trying to woo the person."

Zamasu was instantly offended. "Excuse you, I would _never_ want to even touch a female human or any human in general. What makes you think I would do that?"

James shrugged. "I dunno, she's pretty."

"Well, 'prettiness' does not affect me." Nevermind the fact that Zamasu can't even make direct eye contact with Jay's girlfriend, but that's besides the point.

Adrian just took an exit lane, now about eight minutes away from Rebecca's house. They've been on the road for about forty something minutes. Her mansion resided in North City, like on the very edge of it on the eastern side of Tycho, which is why she came commute to Irene's house pretty often without hassle. Even to her workplace at in South City is a good forty minute drive from her home. Really rich and/or famous people live in North City, as that place is very green and also filled with mansions and large lots. South City could also contest to that, because those who lived in South City had mostly self-customized houses. Some, like Irene, Jay and Adrian, lived in East City, and East City is more of a suburb if anything. Sure they had expensive houses, and Adrian had a giant lot to himself and Jay, but they were nothing compared to many of the houses in North City, _including_ Rebecca's.

"You might as well text her and say that we're close, so that she could lower her gates." Adrian plainly spoke to Jay, who was now typing stuff into his phone.

"You guys have never been here." James said. "If it was my car, I think I'd be taken in. I dunno if she resetted the security thing."

The security thing he was referring to scans the front plate of a car and if the plate is recognized, then the car could enter into whatever the gates barricaded. Zamasu raised a brow. "You've been there before?"

The question made him hesitantly answer for some reason. "Yeah."

"I thought she didn't like you."

"She didn't like _me_ , but… stuff happened in there." James was sort of tight lipped. He shrugged his arms as he spoke, his hands landing on his lap. With the stuff that he was told by them, he could kind of understand what the basketball player was tryna get at.

"What stuff?"

"Sex." Adrian sighed, answering the question simply because at this point, he might as well do so. Zamasu looked down, the past day had changed his _whole_ perspective on the people around him. It was nuts, at best. He wasn't even sure if he could kind of look at Rebecca in the same way because of her sudden attitude, knowing that she had done terrible things for reasons that _nobody_ really knows.

They stopped right in front of her gates. The first thing he noticed as they drove into North City was indeed the greenery, it looked far too beautiful and he almost got annoyed that the car was accelerating because he wanted it to stop and let him look around. All of the sudden, he had this craving to fly around and explore the country. They opened on their own without a required scan, and Adrian entered her mansion, looking all about the place while he stopped in the front lawn for a moment. He didn't stop the car completely, but he looked back at Zamasu.

"Man, it was nice uhh… getting to know you?" He wasn't even sure of what the heck they've accomplished over the course of thirty something hours. "We didn't even try to do that, we just kinda…"

"Chilled..." Jay finished his sentence for him, and Adrian nodded.

"Yeah, but it was fun nonetheless."

Zamasu nodded. "I... see?" Was he supposed to say 'thank you'? What do you say to that? _Ohhh._ "It was… nice meeting you three."

"We already met beforehand." James looked at him. "But this like… solidified us actually meeting."

"Right." The Kaioshin looked past James to see Rebecca opening her door and looking back only to see Ollie run out of her house and towards Adrian's car.

"Ahh, it's Ollie!" Jay opened the door to allow the energetic pug to come into the car, which he did. Ollie hopped onto Jay's lap, and gave him loving licks because that's what Ollie does. He did the same to Adrian when the other producer reached out to pet him. The second he saw Zamasu and James, he pounced right on to the Kaioshin's lap and started barking as he was licking Zamasu.

Zamasu could easily identify why Ollie was doing this; the pug was actually annoyed at the fact that Zamasu hadn't returned with Rebecca, and he was seldom yelling at him for it. "Okay, okay, I'm here now. I figured you missed me, didn't you?"

Ollie barked pretty loudly at that statement. It made the other guys jump slightly.

"Alright, I'll get out now." Zamasu held the pug in his hands and Ollie looked at James. The pug left Zamasu's lap and went to James, giving him his trademark greeting of licking people. Zamasu watched the social pug, even though these men didn't really like his owner, he was _still_ super reciprocative with them, even James.

"Man, I missed ya, Ollie." James chuckled, and Ollie started barking again. This time he was looking at Adrian. For some reason, he went to Adrian and started pulling at his shirt with his mouth, as if beckoning him to get out of his car. It was the same action that Ollie made when he first saw Zamasu, when he was pulling at his leg. The Kaioshin could see that Ollie and Adrian were actually pretty close somehow.

"You want me to get out of my car?" Adrian asked him. He looked up and barked with his shirt in his mouth. "Fine, fine. Guys?"

All four them decided to get out of the car, and Rebecca was already walking out of her house to get Ollie. She stopped mid stride in her patio when she saw all four of them leave Adrian's car, with Ollie laying in Adrian's arms. This was literally the imagery she got; they all got out, and all four of them stood side by side in front of her house saying things to one another before inadvertently walking together towards her patio. Ollie shifted in Adrian's hold, so the producer placed him down and he went to Rebecca and started yipping happily.

"I… actually have never been here." Adrian said, and Zamasu frowned. "Seriously."

The Kaioshin blinked. "Then how is Ollie like that around you?"

"Irene's house, bro. Did you forget about that?"

Zamasu sighed. "I try not to remember."

Adrian chuckled. "I figured." He didn't have enough time to really ask Zamasu _why_ he _still_ hates Irene for being stupid, when Adrian introduced him to video games, got high off of weed brownies, watched him and James bop each other with spoons, fell asleep in his room for more than half a day, and went out to a gun range. From what Irene had told him, the Kaioshin barely went out with her while he stayed at her place. What type of shit would she be doing that would _out-stupid_ what had happened yesterday?

"Hey Zamasu." Rebecca smiled at him, and he gave her a wave back. He partially expected a few extra 'Hi's because the men were here, but that didn't happen at all. "Ollie's been barking up and down for the past thirty minutes."

Which meant that their connection was more intuitive than one could think. Zamasu looked down at Ollie, who was now right in front of him. Loki stepped towards the open door, and pretty much charged at Zamasu in full speed. The Kaioshin was not expected 95 pounds of canine mass to nearly topple him over, but he held the giant fluffy dog in his arms while Loki barked at his face.

"Alright, alright, I'm sorry I left you two for too long!" Zamasu placed him down, and Loki frowned. "Geez."

"You three are something else." Jay shook his head. He and the others noticed how Rebecca didn't say anything else, but before he was about to usher the guys back into Adrian's car, Zamasu spoke again.

"Rebecca." She looked up at Zamasu, his expression was _dead_ serious. "There's more than one individual here, you know."

She looked at the guys, and apologized with a lighthearted giggle. "Oh my gosh, I sorry. Hey guys!" Rebecca gave them a wave, and they did wave back. Zamasu turned around to face the guys once more with a look.

"I mean, we weren't gonna stay for too long, we just had to drop him off." James returned the knowing gaze, but he spoke kindly to Rebecca.

"True, so… we're off now." Adrian said. "Bye, you guys!"

"Peace!" Jay threw a deuces and he and the three walked off, leaving Zamasu surrounded by two dogs, and Rebecca looking at their car as they passed the gates.

The Kaioshin turned around, and entered her home once again, blinking because he had forgotten how big this place was once again. Rebecca closed her door, and looked down at the ground, her trail doing up to Zamasu's back. He removed his shoes immediately, realizing that he had spent an entire day wearing jeans and not his usual garb. Holding them in his hand, he turned around to Rebecca. "Hello."

"Hey." Rebecca had her arms crossed, she was wearing an oversized cardigan which looked pretty cute on her. _Not_ to him, obviously. "How was your little hangout?"

Zamasu didn't turn around for a reason. "It was fine." _I was high_. "Nothing special happened." _I fell asleep for more than sixteen hours._ "It was just as I expected." _I witnessed and laughed at two grown men hit each other with spoons in their mouths._ If anything, he did not expect to get caught up in anything like that. Would that happen again? Probably not. But did he regret it?

The brownies tasted great, to be honest.

"That's great." Rebecca smiled. "I was making something, but I didn't think you guys would come much sooner so… you're probably not gonna get any."

"That's fine by me."

Ollie was against Zamasu's leg trying to get his bestie's attention, and the Kaioshin looked down at him. The pug then ran upstairs, which made him frown, and then came back with a book that Zamasu was reading before he left. To be fair, he hadn't read a book even the day before he left, all he did was listen to music and look at old pictures of the doctor. His lips curved up at the cute pug below him, unfortunately for Ollie he couldn't pull on Zamasu's pants at the moment. He picked up the book from the pug, and looked at Rebecca who passed right by him.

Honestly, it's not like he was hungry, but he didn't want to eat at the moment. He had this itchy feelings of wanting to leave again, and it had nothing to do with Rebecca at all. He just wanted to look around, but first, he ought to freshen up or something. With his book in hand, he looked to the stairs and back at the doctor who was now quietly in the kitchen, and made his way up to where his room was. You understand the _comfort_ that comes from taking off jeans after a long day. Imagine how relieved Zamasu was when he removed his jeans, especially because he's so used to wearing his baggy blue Kai pants, and because he spent more than one day wearing them.

He probably could have busted one from the _freedom_ he had finally gotten.

He debated on whether or not he should take a bath, a bath sounded really soothing and level. He wasn't dirty, Gods don't get dirty, but it was more for… leisure-esque reason. Zamasu stripped completely, taking the biggest exhale ever because he was now friggin' free, and went into the bathroom to turn on the water in the luxurious tub. The Kaioshin looked at the oils and the soaps; there was peppermint, but he wanted something different. He randomly picked one up, which happened to be a smooth, soft pink color. The scent was Rose, and he casually opted for it, only putting a mild amount of it into the water.

He hadn't sat for really long, because the longer he sat, the more his urge to leave this giant, beautiful mansion grew. He was in there for more than several minutes, but when he finally got out he pretty much zipped the way out the bathroom with a towel to dry himself off. Putting on his entire godly magnificent gi, he looked down feeling the familiarity in his attire again, and went for his white boots. Without wasting any time, he looked out his room window, opening it slightly to feel the cool breeze of the evening. It brushed his face, and made his hair flutter softly.

A tiny, shy bark came from his door, and he turned around to see the gentle-giant malamute. When Loki came in the room, Zamasu's leg was already against the windowsill. Loki yipped quietly this time, almost inquisitively, and Zamasu left the window to kneel in front of the confused malamute.

"Loki," he rubbed Loki's head, "I won't be gone for long. I just want to explore."

A quiet uptoned bark.

"I just have the strong urge to do so. I'll be back before the night is over." There was a pause, Loki was considering his intention. And then, Loki yipped in agreement, resting his paw against Zamasu's knee.

The Kaioshin stood up. "If Ollie is wondering, make sure he doesn't worry either, alright?" A final bark was given before Zamasu went back to where the window was. Loki left his room, and the Kaioshin opened the window fully and levitated out of the room. He was floating several meters in the air, but he had risen himself so that he could get a full downward view of Rebecca's house. He looked around, and then started heading West.

Halfway through him looking down and seeing the landscape gradually cut into East City, he had an idea. The Kaioshin could teleport anywhere he wanted, given he had a visual of the place he wanted to go. Since his transporting skills were quite exceptional, all he needed were a few well-placed items in one premise in order to go there. Here's the catch; Zamasu hasn't been around many places, to be fair, and he can pretty much end up anywhere that happens to have the item or items he has in mind. He figured this out one time while he was training, and he had never utilized that aspect of his ability because it's not really courteous to be somewhere you're not supposed to be.

But he was smart. It's not like he'll end up in a restricted area and end up putting his body in danger. He's a God, he's smarter than that.

The first thing that came to his mind, just to warm this ability up, was some random building. Not the inside of it, but the satellite-esque of it from where he was. The roof of the building should be blue with all those silly venting contraptions on it, and the surrounding area would have… perhaps a lake? That would make sense. So this vision took place in his mind, and given a mere second, he was transported to this random building with a lake nearby. How sweet.

Zamasu descended until he was at the foot of the lake, there were lilypads and tiny amphibians jumping about and around. A few caught his eyes; some of these animal were very colorful, even the tiny frogs had vibrant colors about them. Much of this place wasn't groomed, so it was obvious that no one actually owned this lake or whatnot. The building, he turned to his far right to look at it, probably had humans in it, but from where he was the building wasn't that close. He took a criss-crossed seat in front of the lake and watched the animals in front of him do their animal things.

It's a rather calming sight, to see little fish wiggle around and various others waltzing happily. He was looking out to the farther part of the lake when a frog hopped and landed on his hand, and Zamasu looked down and was stunned by what he saw. The frog on his green hand was mostly black, with amber colored eyes and lines that ran around his body. It's belly was also a fully amber hue, and when Zamasu reached out to touch it's little head, it lowered itself from the contact. It was tiny, small enough to fit in his palm, but it was so radiant and lively. He allowed it to stay on his hand until it wanted to leave while he looked around longer.

Just after the frog left his hand and landed on a lily pad, Zamasu decided to take this 'random access teleportation' thing another step further. He was curious, so he decided to visualize perhaps a white room with incandescent lights, and a potted plant in a white vase. For some reason, he was focusing much more on the plant rather than the room; the plant itself was tall and had long green leaves, but it had no flowers. He allowed the image to linger in his mind before he was transported to where this setting could be…

And he ended up in a hospital.

But Zamasu didn't know it was a hospital, until he realized that he wasn't alone in the room. There was a cabinet of medical things, and when he turned around, he saw an elderly woman lying in a hospital bed with her eyes closed. She was breathing, she was alive, and he was certain that she was also conscious. The misanthropic Kaioshin took a step closer to her person, and that was when her eyes opened slowly and turned to the direction of the quiet footstep with a look of dire expectation, but was wiped out with a look of confusion when she saw Zamasu.

The room itself was very quiet, so she heard him without a problem. The old woman had white hair, blue eyes and fair skin. She blinked slowly at the Kaioshin, and then she looked away with disappointment. Zamasu didn't move any further than that, he wasn't trying to sneak up on her in any way, but he also didn't expect such a reaction from her. She didn't even look shocked at the fact that he teleported into her room, but Zamasu could see why; this woman looked like _all semblance_ of life was drained out of her, even if he done a split and was wearing a glittery shirt saying 'Moist' in Comic Sans font she probably wouldn't have any sort of reaction.

He was really curious as to why she was like this, and what led to her lying here, in a hospital. The old woman weakly cleared her throat, and from the sound of it Zamasu could tell that she hadn't spoke in quite a while. Her throat moved up and down as she swallowed. "Do you want something?"

That was the first thing she said to him. She didn't sound spiteful or anything, but this old sickly woman asked _him_ if _he_ wanted something. Shouldn't she be the last person to ask such a question? "Umm… no…" He said that in an belabored tone, but he didn't ignore the woman by turning around and she was aware enough to notice that.

She kept looking and glancing at him as if she was expecting him to leave the room, and it's not because she wanted him to. Being a God, you're already blessed with high intuition, and Zamasu could see that her expectation derived from people already doing this to her. It kind of made sense, since she was in a hospital room all alone, with no other human monitoring her at all.

The old woman slightly nodded, and she looked downwards. Zamasu decided to pop the random question. "What happened to you?"

He said that with no emotional conviction, but the woman looked slightly surprised at the fact that he would ask her such a question. She blinked very slowly, and parted her lips only to close them again. It's that thing that old people do, when they open their mouths and then close it. "I got sick."

A simple answer, but it was more complicated than that. Yet the elder woman didn't want to say much, out of fear of belittlement. "Sick?"

She nodded. "Been sick for several years now, maybe more."

He blinked, and looked at her stature. She was laying down in all white, she had an IV attached to her with some clear liquid that he assumed was probably water, and her hospital bed had lights around it with indicators for her vials. There were bandages that he saw at the end of her semi-exposed collarbone, and a weird clamp thingy on one of her ring fingers. "Sick with what?"

"Oh," Her shrugs were trying too hard to look nonchalant, but there was pain behind it. "Just a few things; blood loss… I get dehydrated easily, sores and… whatnot."

Because of the advances in technology on this planet, most of the illnesses that were once incurable were either consigned or easily treated. However, that didn't mean that some forms of viruses became _smarter_ as they evolved. The humans of this planet took great care of themselves, so the actual _considerable_ illnesses that they had were deadly, and that could only happen if someone wasn't taking good care of themselves. He assumed that was what happened to this woman, something took place in her life to make her health go downhill, which _led_ to her getting sick.

He sat down on the chair that was right in front of her, and instantly was aware of how _cold_ the seat was. Has anyone been in this room in the past _week_? The old woman before him was staring out the window with a painfully longing face, she's been stuck to a hospital bed for so long. Because of his increased intuition, he can feel the sadness in her movements, and it made him slightly shake his head. The old woman had been suffering far too long-

Which brought up a sudden question within him. "Why are you kept here?" It made no sense to keep a person alive if they are suffering for so long, so much so that you can _feel_ it if you sit next to her.

The old woman swallowed as she thought about his question. "I don't even know." Four tiny little words managed to hold so much weight in them, it was starting depress the vibe around him. He shook it off, and she inhaled. "I really don't know at this point. I've had surgery, nothing has changed my condition. The only thing that gave me was anemia, and they spent years trying to treat me but it's been getting worse. I can't even leave this room anymore."

She wasn't ranting, she had no energy to rant, that was what her reality was. Zamasu looked down at the ground, this woman looked like she had been left alone for a really long time. If what she said wasn't more than enough, her outlook on life was; at this point, the elderly woman was just _waiting_ to die. That's not something that hospitals do for you, right? The nurses and doctors in hospitals are here to help their own kind, so why is this woman suffering in front of him? "All of this technology and humans _still_ can't help one another."

"It's not their fault." She said that, as if she was convincing herself that as well. "It's not their fault, this sickness I have is very persistent so it's permanent to my life… pretty much." Her arms shifted, and she casted her gaze to the side. "They did their best..."

She sounded like she herself didn't believe that.

Zamasu looked around the room, only to be alerted by hearing the sounds of voices coming closer to the room. The old woman caught the sound too, and it was _now_ that she looked at Zamasu. "I don't think you'd want to be here with other doctors as well. They're probably going to give me my treatment."

"And?" He didn't know why she was so alarmed.

"You need to leave."

As medical procedure, obviously no other person should be in a hospital room besides the doctor and the patient. It made sense, however she was speaking as if she was embarrassed. The Kaioshin only blinked at her expression.

The elder woman was now hastily whispering. "Please go! Just go, for now!"

Right after she said that, she strained her throat a little too much and lightly coughed. Zamasu decided that he should take his leave, he stood up and stepped back, teleporting out of the room right before the hospital room door opened.

He ended up above the building, looking down for a moment before deciding to actually fly off and wander around manually, the old woman's words subconsciously running though his mind.

 _You need to leave…._

 _Just go, for now..._

ШшШшШшШшШшШшШшШшШшШшШ

Zamasu flew out, once again, to find a random area to walk through and explore. He descended until he was just about several feet below the clouds keeping his gaze directly downstairs to find a very verdant forest. He flew downwards and landed, his white boots making contact with the dirt and he looked around the entire scenery.

You know, from an aerial view, a forest always manages to look relatively commonplace. But a forest is one of those things where you have to zoom in real close in order to see its true intricacy and beauty. This particular forest he landed on was the most _beautiful_ premise he had ever seen on Earth. There were tall, various trees with lively leaves on their branches, an aesthetic consistency of vines that hung from tree to tree swirling around different trunks or just dangling in the natural walkway. All of the grass and dirt were of lively hues as well, ferns and wildflowers as well as bushes and moss decorated the forest. The softening sunlight bled through the trees, blessing the area with warm rays of sunset, and Zamasu looked up to behold the sky's orange sunset. There were small animals that went about around him; squirrels scurried about, birds quietly chirped, there was a rabbit that happened to waltz by as Zamasu continued wandering through this heavenly forest, and raccoons sat sporadically on the branches of trees.

Nothing went through his mind as he traversed the area with no dirtied intention whatsoever. Meditative grey eyes softened as little birds would momentarily perch on his shoulders, or when the squirrels would approach and look up at him with doe eyes, in fact almost every animal within the forest that caught sight of him showed fondness to him. The only animal who happened to be playing neutral around the Kaioshin was one particular rabbit; it would sit amongst the bushes or behind the tree watching him as he walked, and Zamasu would randomly catch sight of the rabbit several times. It was white with random black spots in its fur and had attentive dark brown eyes. The rabbit would bounce in and out of Zamasu's general area, but it was always there regardless. The Kaioshin found its enigmatic nature interesting; as other animals would approach him because Gods in general can connect best with innocent beings, this rabbit did not avoid him, but it also didn't forthright any fondness to him.

He had spent perhaps thirty or so minutes venturing through this place, and one thing remained certain; the rabbit would appear in front of him and continue on, as if it wanted Zamasu to follow suit but only _vaguely_. It was weird, Zamasu just realized that the walkway was just going in the same direction as the rabbit was, yet it would stop just to see where he was at, and if he happened to get closer, the rabbit would move forward and repeat the process.

Is this a perfunctory version of _Cat and Mouse_ , or in this case _God and Rabbit_? That's what it felt like, though this time Zamasu decided he wasn't going to play games anymore. The rabbit cutely bounced forward, it was a good fifteen feet away from the Kaioshin when it turned around and this time Zamasu just watched its pudgy body. The rabbit looked mighty fluffy and was chewing on something that was too small for Zamasu to see. After about a few seconds, he had gathered a conclusion; the rabbit was... _watching_ him. It was following _his_ movements to see where the Kaioshin would go and only turned around whenever Zamasu was too far for him to enact. It didn't have a particular set objective to either follow him or lead him, it was using Zamasu's actions to indicate and move based on _both_ actions. The Kaioshin took a coy step back; this rabbit, by his evidence, was trying to beckon him somewhere.

He was partially wrong. Only on the last part though, because as he took a few steps back, the rabbit went to the left and disappeared into the woods.

That immediately caught his attention, and he went forward to wherever this little mammal bounced to. Opening the bushes, he didn't see it at all even though it had left his sight a couple seconds ago. It was as if the rabbit vanished into thin air.

Zamasu heard the sound of rustling from his right, which was where the grassy walkway was. He took steps back into the walkway and found the rabbit had just hopped out of a bush that was far ahead of him, and was now sitting in the middle of the walkway. Is there something this intelligent rabbit wanted to convey? This was more than just simplistic animal behavior, and the Kaioshin was more than intuitive enough to see that this rabbit wasn't just strolling around randomly.

Allowing the little bugger to both ascertain his movements, and lead him forward at the same time, Zamasu had saw an opening out of the forest and he was surprised that this place even had an end to it. He looked to the sky to see that it was now a dusk blue-purple hue; just how long had he been out here? The Kaioshin had reached the end, looking down as he stepped out and then looking back up only to freeze and _gaze_ at what he was introduced to.

The forest was clear out of his sight, that was for sure, but this whole area was completely different. While the forest was nature-filled and unkempt, this place it had led to was _unbelievably_ astounding. This large opening was verdant, and the grass was cleanly cut, well-pampered bushes bordered beautiful stone garden walkways, all of which were connected to a fountain which had a kinetic polished circle pattern thing that… seemed to individually go in and out of itself? Zamasu didn't know, but the water that would flow out of it along with this fountain's glowing appearance was mesmerizing, he could probably stare at it forever.

But he couldn't, because there was so much going on in this large place that he couldn't help but look around. As he passed the fountain, he saw _huge_ crop circles in the distance and by distance, it was several hundreds of feet away from where he was standing. Said crop circles were probably about _three times_ bigger than Rebecca's mansion, and all of it appeared to be encapsulated in a lightly tinted greenhouse; there were special lamps within that hung above the plants and from his view, he noticed there were people within this giant space perhaps harvesting all the crops that were in the giant circles. Around the large greenhouse was the same stone walkway with outside lamps, in fact these lamps were all around the vicinity, that all turned on once the sky had gotten dark. It was like a quick lightshow; the lamps had turned on in the farther distance and it grew like a tidal wave, Zamasu noticed them fade into radiance, illuminating the walkway with a healthy glow of white lights.

Not only did this place have fields, but there was a large platform which sat two sleek, pearl white jets with gleaming red undertones, some of which actually a green hue due to the reflection of the light proximity of the lamps. Thought Zamasu didn't know what a jet was, so he just assumed that was just a giant, winged car with little propulsors. Far behind the platform was another sort of greenery, along with a sharp-looking building that looked _incredibly_ technologically savvy; this house didn't look as big as Rebecca's mansion, but it might as well be because this place already has synchronizing outside lamps and giant gardens and huge winged vehicles-

The Kaioshin could have been horridly blind, but the nearest thing to his left, or rather a few hundred feet from his position, happened to be a _giant_ , white building with nonreflective tinted windows. The exterior wasn't as greenly decorated, but it still had well-kept building, or _buildings_ , were actually four gigantic elongated domes placed in a spaced square position and were connected on the bottom levels, beveled off on their own only to be connected with see through walkways about two hundred feet above that had clean, reflective glass walls. If anything, this place looked like an amazingly spiffy laboratory. Zamasu had noticed there was a floating rectangular prism going around the top floors and descending down akin to how a plane would, then disappearing behind the lab. Giant might as well be a terrific _understatement_ , because the sheer size and cleanliness of this place almost looked intimidating to the Kaioshin, and would probably make a human stagger back in trepidity.

The entrance had been opened ever since he'd been here, Zamasu's painfully growing curiosity pulled him closer to the large entrance of the building. The lights within weren't on either, but that didn't deter the Kaioshin from taking a step inside. Indeed, the entrance led to a hallway that was completely pristine white. The ceiling had protruding rectangles that once Zamasu stepped in started lighting up the entire corridor. He went to the wall, absentmindedly feeling the shiny white material against his fingertips, his head tilting in wonderment with no words spoken.

Several stories above the Kaioshin, a lab door slid open and a male walked in, his white insulated two-inch heeled boots made delicate clinking contact with the tiled floor. He was wearing a lab coat with baggy black pants that were tucked under the boots he wore, carried a tablet against his hip, and his hair was in a loose low ponytail. He went directly to where all the varying computers were, right in front of a large actuality simulator, and placed his logs down and started rapidly punching in codes and functions. Within a few minutes, he heard blinking from the small tablet device, and he took it in his hand. Making a swiping motion upwards on the right side of the object, it pulled up a holographic screen of camera feeds around his lab building, his house, the fields, pretty much every situated place in the vicinity. One particular surveillance feed caught his eyes and he tapped it to zoom in a bit closer to get a better look at what intrigued him.

The man frowned and tilted his head… _Why is there a green alien in the main entrance?_

He raised a brow, as he watched this particular alien continue staring at the walls and all around the entrance corridor, and then started traveling even further. This was where the man shook his head and wasting no time, he opened up another log on the holographic and pressed a few buttons.

Zamasu started walking forward instead of turning back and out of the building. He had barely made it halfway through the corridor, it wasn't even that long in the first place, when the end of the corridor abruptly closed on its own. He frowned, and heard the sound of another door closing and turned around. The entrance was closed off, both exits from the corridor now covered with large, metal barriers. Suddenly, the lights started doing this weird thing where it would flash red, and then Zamasu heard a low frequency sound that grazed his ears lightly. Was this a place that he was supposed to be in?

Without warning, the Kaioshin was slammed to the ground by the sudden change in gravity. This room not only had really interesting looking lights, but had the ability to execute gravity _twenty_ times more powerful than Earth's normal.

 _I'll take that as a definite No._

He started groaning and grunting, trying to lift his arms up but unfortunately he could barely get them half a centimeter off the ground. He did the same with his legs and they too wouldn't move. The Shinjin were not accustomed to higher ascertainments of gravity, with this intensity it would be enough to crush a human in an instant, but the Kaioshin was only feeling his body's inability to move.

"Why-… who the hell… is doing thi-" His eyes widened when he realized that if he stayed like this he might actually be in _a bit of danger_ , because he was starting to feel his ribcage being independently pressed against his chest by the weight of the corridor around him. He closed his eyes and imagined what the outside of the corridor would look like, as that is the only thing a Kai needs to do in order to teleport to said place. Zamasu felt himself teleport, and the gravity was no longer pulling his lungs out of his cage again. He stood up slowly, placing a hand over his chest and breathing heavily. "Just _what the heck_ was that?"

Zamasu was now out of the corridor, but he had teleported inside of the actual building. This was the place right after the entrance hallway, the spacey area was still white but this time, it had light blue polished floors which were actually chiseled before being polished, and the walls were once again white. There were square tiles that bordered the walls halfway, and the whole vibe was very futuristic; the dividers were thin and had lights in them, the ceiling even had pure lights in them. He took a few steps forward, observing the lobby-esque area.

Pressing several buttons on his simulator, and clicking away at the screen to control the machine within the simulator, the labcoat-clad man was given another blink from his surveillance device. He pulled it up and kept it on this time, seeing the same green man from the corridor somehow end up in the front lobby. He narrowed his eyes, but when back to what he was doing, as he knew that his automated security will tighten that up for him.

Zamasu heard a faint sound coming from the upper right region of the room. He looked up but didn't catch anything in particular, until the sound literally stopped out of nowhere. Just when he thought the random onslaught was over, there was then an alarming beeping sound that went off. Only once however, but suddenly some of the squared tiles turned and started shooting out weird projectiles at him. Zamasu couldn't move out the way fast enough because he didn't perceive any of this to happen, and when he was hit with multiple of them simultaneously, this projectile had emptied itself of the fluid that was packed inside of it.

These projectiles were thrown at a very fast velocity but worked in the same way that new-age tranquilizers did, they weren't made to completely puncture the body. The velocity of these needles would force the fluids to be ejected into whatever they made contact with, and in this case it was the green Kaioshin. All of the projectiles ejected their fluids when they made contact with them, and the Kaioshin felt every single shot go _straight_ to his brain. He let out a short yelp of irritation feeling the inside of his body grow strangely cold, especially at the cervical part of his spine, his temple, and his entire back. Even more of these shots are barraged at him and Zamasu took this time to rub off all of these weird needle thingies off of him. He let out another pained groan feeling an unfamiliar dull ache in his head that felt like someone had poked the space between his skull and left eye, and he reach up to grasp his forehead and shake his head to rid of whatever was injected into him.

That was a really, _really_ bad idea.

If this wasn't aimed for neurotic displacement, the Kaioshin wouldn't have been affected. But the overflow of substances was doing quite a number on him especially because when he just shook his head, he ended up _feeling_ the liquids _slosh around_ inside of him. Grey eyes were erratically looking everywhere, realizing that this was affecting his vision; anywhere he looked would seem to zoom in yet stretch out, as if he had lost his complete field of view, and the world seemed to teeter from side to side.

The man continued to observe the fallen Kaioshin, there was sound equipped on this surveillance device, and he listened as he heard the green alien speak with a male voice.

This made him raise a brow. "He's speaking…" A tilt of his head as he watched the other clutch his head and start dizzily wandering around the area. It seemed as though the green man was speaking semi-coherently, and behaving under pain and intense vertigo. He then grabbed the device and pulled up another log, pressing the button to toggle all of the shooting projectiles to stop immediately.

Meanwhile, the Kaioshin was experiencing adverse effects of the substance within him. "What is going on?"

"What is happening?"

"Why is everything moving!?"

"How am I so _dizzy_? Am I falling right now? Why is the ground so close and why is it moving away!?"

Did he just voice his thoughts out loud?

The only indication he could make of feasible movement was the sudden contact with the floor his chest made, and his eyes were out looking ahead. He didn't know how long he had stayed that way, but it was getting harder to tell where his body was as time passed. Why… was this having such adverse effect on him? He was a _god_ , for crying out loud!

It was at this moment he had just realized that the shooting had stopped, and he was laying on the ground and his hearing was getting displaced. He was still seeing blotchy colors and the lobby seemed to contort and squeeze, he didn't know if his head was swaying side to side or not. The tiniest bit of actual physical movement would upset his head, and the blotches would pulse along with the impending headache he was getting. He didn't want to believe that this silly security system was having an affect on him, but the more he tried to fight it, the worse it would get.

The Kaioshin flinched as he heard a 'ding' noise somewhere in the right, or left, he didn't really know anymore, and then the sound of heeled footsteps approaching him. These heels were weirdly the only thing he could clearly hear amidst the swirling ringing noises he was being ambushed by, and because of his distorted hearing, it was unreasonably loud.

"Whahhat-" Did he just _slur_? This substance was affecting his speech as well? Zamasu blinked rapidly, muttering 'no' repeatedly trying desperately to get out of this terrible state. He saw a pair of white heeled boots walk in front and face him. Without thinking and on impulse, Zamasu reached out and grabbed the ankle of whoever was wearing those boots and noticed that his hand wasn't green anymore… it was freaking pink, and it was _fucking shrinking_.

He literally shrieked, shooting up from his laying position, and then quickly falling onto his back with his lolling upwards. He stared at the white ceiling, those same color blotches were now black spots in his vision. The booted being now approached his side and Zamasu could only see a black outline of their body. Barely any colors were registering in his mind, his head, back, ears, and chest were still numbingly cold with every breath he took, and he let out a weak distressed groan. The Kaioshin felt the influx of substances start to affect his ability to stay conscious, and deciding that he couldn't bear to see and feel anything at the moment, he allowed it to take over completely, putting him into a discharging coma.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 _ **This**_ **is why you don't fuck with men in lab coats, okay.**

 **Can I just say that this chapter took the** _ **longest**_ **to write? I dunno know why, there was so many bottlenecks involved here, but it's over! I'm lowkey wondering if any of you get that 'Moist' reference, it's from a particular live stream on Youtube. If you did I'll love you forever xP**

 **Personally, between you and me, I kinda laughed at Zamasu going through those hallucinations (alright, I'm mean for that, but just** _ **imagine**_ **, just** _ **think**_ **about how that would look like). But now, Zamasu now ends up passing out on his own because of hs condition, what do you expect will happen to him now that the mysterious man confronted his person?**


	23. Disciplinary Measures

**This week went by so slow, and fast at the same time. I seriously would have missed another upload today because of it lol.**

 **I** _ **know,**_ **I know; what happened in the last chapter sounds crazy. Sure it does, but it makes sense. Please be reminded, as I have said this before, this is prior to Zamasu meeting Goku, meaning that this dude ain't no future Zamasu here; he's not** _ **immortal**_ **in this fanfic. He's still an** _ **apprentice**_ **, he can still be** _ **affected**_ **by things and whatnot. I'm not going into much detail because why it happened is already stated** _ **in this chapter**_ **.**

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 **Disciplinary Measures**

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Ollie is a simple pug. When he sees something he likes, he goes for it without a hitch.

Loki is a sweet malamute. He would do anything in order to support the people and beings he loved without a hitch.

When you put these two canine kiddies together, one of two things become apparent; cute and manageable times, and mischievous mishaps.

Rebecca had went out yesterday to buy another bag of _special_ treats for her dogs, only meant to be eaten whenever they learn something or do something exceptionally well. Today, it was in the morning, and Rebecca had left for work. Both dogs were sitting in Ollie's room when the idea just came to them, and the two got up and went downstairs with no hesitation whatsoever.

The first thing Loki intuitively did was look out of the glass walls, nudging the curtain so that he could outside. Rebecca's car wasn't here, and he heard Ollie's tiny bark come from the kitchen. The younger brother of the two (yes, Ollie is Loki's older brother) waltzed into the kitchen to see the pug sitting on the countertop looking up at the cabinet to Loki's right. Ollie was too small, but he was far too hyped up for this 'plan', and was prancing about on top of the countertop trying to hop on top of the cabinet. Loki supplemented his aid; the malamute himself hopped onto the countertop, and stood on his hind legs at an angle with his paws against the top of the cabinet, which is where the treats were. The bag was half an arm's distance away, and it was blue with a clear part where you could see the treats on the front of the bag. Loki couldn't reach it, but that was not his objective; Ollie went back and started walking up Loki in order to reach the top of the cabinet. Once he had gotten there, Loki lowered himself back down, and looked up with a bark.

The communication between these two is impeccable, it goes _beyond words_.

Ollie gave a bark back, and he started nudging the bag. The pug paused for a moment, and then nudged it again and again, only to realize that it wasn't budging. The bag was actually quite heavy for a small pug like him to push, especially because a bag of flour was right in front of it. The pug was getting impatient, he went forward to the flour bag and tried to move it away from the treat bag so that he could push it off the ledge. Loki had already supplemented the impending fall with a pillow in front of the cabinet,and he sat back watching Ollie barking every once in awhile. Ollie was noticeably getting excited, because the flour bag was moving to the side making way for the treat bag. He was using his mouth to pull this bag, and Loki started moving around seeing that this plan was working.

There was a big problem with this; the flour bag wasn't opened, but it was folded outwards, and that fold had a hefty amount of flour in it. One simple slip up, and the bag could either tear open, or fall completely, and Ollie wasn't keeping his pawsteps in track. At some point, the door of the cabinet started moving underneath Ollie's paws, and Loki didn't see this coming because he was too excited himself. As Ollie pulled harder, the door was getting more and more dangerously close to being open. The creaking of the door became more and more apparent, and Loki slowed his pacing to a complete stop. He blinked, and then barked.

Ollie couldn't return the bark at the moment because he had a flour bag in his mouth, but he wasn't paying attention to his paws, and the creaking cabinet door.

The moral of this right here is, don't… try to sneak in food that you're not supposed to eat. It won't end well, no matter how elaborate your plan was.

Without warning, the cabinet door slid open, and the sides of Ollie's paws lost their footing. He still had the bag in his mouth, but he could only let out a yap of alarm before he went tumbling down with the flour bag to the kitchen floor. And apparently, Loki's spatial math was lacking, because the pillow only caught Ollie and broke his fall, but didn't save the flour bag which had now exploded open, covering a large portion of the floor, and all of Ollie, in white flour.

It was all-purpose flour, too.

Loki just looked on silently, at both the pug and the flour on the floor, waving his paw in the air and blinking because the flour had flew everywhere. The malamute pretty much let out the most _unconfidently_ quiet bark he ever mustered, and Ollie slowly got up and wiggled himself free of the excess flour on his pudgy body. He looked down at the green pillow saturated in flour, and then hopped off quickly to stand next to Loki. He looked down at the mess, and then started barking and pacing around.

Yep, they did a _bad thing_.

It was brought to their attention that the flour bag isn't the _only_ thing that was bound to fall. Their objective, the treat bag, was now laying forward off the edge of the top of the cabinet. Loki looked up and barked repeatedly to get the panicking pug's attention, as the treat bag slowly slid forward. He went to the side of the cabinet, and picked up the pillow with his mouth, and Ollie quickly caught on with the idea. They both had opposite ends held with their mouths, and they moved forward to have the treat fall onto the pillow.

Once again, their spatial math sucked, because the cabinet door was not completely open, so the door broke its fall before the pillow did, and the treat bag just landed harshly spilling the treat out and scattering them with the flour on the floor.

They have made a mess. They have made a giant mess, and they don't know how to clean it. And now, their owner's favorite pillow was covered in flour. Ollie and Loki exchanged looks at one another, and then turned back to the flour and treat entropy in front of them. They were gonna be in big trouble.

Well... on the bright side, _they got their treats at least._

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The low, nearly inaudible hum was the first thing Zamasu's sensitive ears could pick up. His chest was slowly rising and falling, he was breathing normally again.

The second thing that came to him was sensation, feeling. The Kaioshin was laying on a cushioned lab bed. His feet were exposed, his boots were removed for some reason, and all he felt was cold yet comfortable, misty air touching and grazing his face, hands and feet softly. That same hum he kept hearing indicated that this bed was electronically powered because he can feel faint vibrations beneath his body resounding from the lab bed.

Then came scent. He didn't smell anything because the dense air he was breathing was odorless. Soon after, involuntary movement took place; his lip twitched and parted ad he allowed the dense air into his mouth and out. He frowned, eyes still closed; Zamasu felt the cool air go into his lungs and right out. But there was something different; the air was cool indeed, but it felt denser than normal air. Not that it wasn't something he couldn't breathe in, but it felt strange even in contact with and going into his body. It had strange properties; if he were to hold the strange air in his mouth, in would have liquefied within a few seconds.

Grey eyes slowly opened and blinked, seeing nothing but dense, cloudy white air. It surrounded him everywhere, even when he turned his head all he'd see was white. His hands and feet felt like they were being caressed by mere air, and he closed his eyes for a few seconds. Zamasu felt… _oddly serene_. He didn't worry or fret or anything, he just laid there quietly and calmly and this was probably a direct effect from inhaling this white stuff.

He heard muffled beeping noises, which then came with a sound of a click. The incubation chamber he was in opened with a pliant hissing sound, the automated top going upward on its own. Zamasu watched as the white clouds were starting to dissipate, and he held his hand up quickly… just to check and see if he didn't actually turn pink. His hand was still green, and he looked down, vaguely being able to pinpoint his feet but he could see that they were also green.

He frowned. Those weird projectiles made him _hallucinate_.

A single arm swiped the white clouds only once, they were dissipating as they made contact with oxygen. Zamasu could finally see the ceiling of whatever room he was in, and this time it wasn't white; it had blue incandescent lights, and was a chiseled, powder blue color. His hand was still raised so he couldn't fully see anything that was on his left which was where the arm came from.

"You're awake."

Zamasu blinked; the very clear sound of that male voice made him frown because all he heard was weird distorted ringing when he was hallucinating, and muffled _-everything_ ever since he had awoken. This particular voice sounded so satiny and soft to the Kaioshin's ears, there weren't enough words to describe how it sounded like. All he knew was that it was very pleasant to his ears. The Kaioshin lowered his hand which uncovered the sight of the person who spoke to him. Once he got a full glance of the man's face, all Zamasu could was _stare_.

... _Did he end up on a different planet or something_? What the heck happened while he was asleep? He had walked into this weird, gigantic laboratory, was nearly crushed by artificial gravity, and was shot with needles so many times that he had hallucinated, witnessed the world swivel and stretch and warp, saw his hand shrinking and turning pink and fell into a damned coma. Now he realized he was in a technical incubator of some sort, breathing in a weird kind of air that made him feel calm and peaceful, and now this man… this person he was staring at was just…

The Kaioshin, in his hundreds of thousands of years living, had _never_ seen such an exotic looking human face in his life. The male had light, golden tan skin, that of which was well taken cared of, very vibrant and lively and clear of any blemishes whatsoever. He was wearing a white lab coat, and looked as though he had a lean muscle build because his shoulders didn't look so big, and he had pitch jet black hair that was in a very messy low ponytail. His black eyebrows were naturally shaped and beautifully arched. The most striking trait to his appearance, as if everything else wasn't so striking, were his eyes; they were a _pure molten gold_ color, and his lashes were thicker than the eyelashes Zamasu had seen on other humans. Zamasu slowly sat up, still staring at the man; he could have second guessed that this was makeup, but his eyelashes were _naturally_ that thick. In fact, everything on his face was natural, _this_ was the man bared faced.

Zamasu blinked like six times in his observation; there was no way that this person could be human. There is _no way_ that a mere human being could have such flawless skin and face and eyes naturally, without any sort of touch up or anything. Thought this time he wasn't reminded of Lexi even though she was pretty with or without makeup, this man was completely _bared faced_ and he looked like _this_. He looked unreal, rather _ethereal_ for that matter…

Fingers were snapped in front of Zamasu and he blinked again, sort of detracting from his acute gaze. The man had a slight frown on his face, and then he looked down to something that was below the incubator. He then looked up, his head making a sway motion as he did so to get the loose long hairs out of his face. He placed both hands down on the side top that was installed with the incubator, and propped himself on one leg.

"I've seen that you could speak and assume that you understand me right now." Zamasu slowly nodded to what he said, with a wondrous look. He continued to speak, not even raising his soft voice. "You were wandering out of the forest and through the garden late at night. I'd like to know how you ended up here and why."

 _Okay… wait a minute_ ; Zamasu's eyes went wide, this man knew _exactly_ where he was yesterday, and knew that he could speak even though Zamasu hadn't said a word to him yet! There was no way this person was human at all, Zamasu refused to believe it. There was _no one_ outside when Zamasu was walking, nobody was near him as he wandered through that magnificent garden and Zamasu knew no one was physically spying on him. This man wasn't human; no human being has the ability to be _multi-present_ , and that's exactly what this person seemed to be. The Kaioshin looked at him, quickly realizing that he wasn't able to make direct eye contact without blinking. He frowned, the man wasn't upset at his intrusion at all, he looked blatantly curious.

Zamasu had a bunch of questions in his green head, but he was more compelled to answer the man's first before he'd assess his own. So he answered honestly. "I flew here."

The man blinked. "Flew?"

"Yes."

A tilt of his head, which made his ponytail tilt with him. "With a spaceship?"

Zamasu looked to the side and then back at him. "No, _I_ actually flew here. Like, _flew_ flew." The man raised a brow, though Zamasu continued. "I was just flying and I landed in that forest and sort of… ended up here. I have no other reason to be here."

The man nodded. Whatever he was looking down at was brought up, and it was a holographic tablet. He tapped somewhere, and the computer devices behind him had keys that changed their incandescent colors. He turned around and started walking towards the computers, Zamasu watched the gait of this man. His lab coat went down to his lower calves, and it was made in a way to well fit the torso of the person wearing it. His ponytail looked weird; his hair was tied into one and then brought back up, which made the ends of his hair look spiked against the back of his head. Had it been left free, his hair would probably go past his lower back. He placed the tablet on the table, and turned around again to return back to where he previously was, resting his elbow against the incubator and his cheek against the side of his arm. Zamasu still had his eyes on him; this man's walk looked confident but aired a lot of attractive mysteriousness to him. "Then why'd you continue on?"

Zamasu was too busy staring at him to respond immediately. But he did blink out of it though. "I got curious."

A tiny smirk appeared on his face. "You know, walking through a place like this could get you hurt pretty badly. This vicinity is kind of off limits." He lowered his arm. "I think you ought to know that."

This man was kindly speaking to him as though he were some normal person, and wasn't giving him weird looks or staring at the Kaioshin. Zamasu was the one in this room who was literally green, and this guy didn't seem to frown, raise his guard out of fear, or make jokes about his appearance. At the airport, or pretty much anywhere Zamasu was at in public, he'd get weird looks and batted eyes from human for not looking like them, which he expected. Some of them even got scared, that he also expected. But he never seen this man before, and this man never saw him prior to this day either, but he was comfortable with talking to him.

"Are you human?" Zamasu had to ask, he seriously had to know this for sure.

The question made the man raise a brow, and then his lips curved upward slightly. "Yes..." Zamasu shifted a little, now sitting with his legs crossed. He started looking closer, and the man tilted his head again. "Why do you ask?"

"Because…" Why did he ask again? "You don't look… human."

That made him frown. "I'm certain I have everything that a human consists of, umm. I don't see a difference."

"No, it's not that. You just…" He held his held up trying to convey the reason for his curiosity. "Your face is… too perfect, there's no... there's nothing weird on it."

The man made a confused face but then chuckled. Zamasu somehow found his smile to be innocent and hearty, like a child. "Thank you?" He turned around and went back to the computers, the Kaioshin was inwardly getting frustrated at how this person kept moving back and forth. Not because his movement was annoying, but because he wasn't getting enough time to fully study his face. Is that weird?

The side of the incubator automatically folded itself open, now it allowed Zamasu to swing his legs to the side of the bedding. The man was typing away, but he turned his head to the side to address him. "I feel as though you have some questions in mind, especially since you don't seem to know where you are."

That was true. Zamasu had felt the effects of the white cloudy air completely wear off, and now his irritation, confusion, and semi-anger made its way back to the surface. His hands gestured as he spoke. "What the _**hell**_ was that?!"

He didn't turn around, but he did pause momentarily. "What was what?"

"What happened to me! I was being crushed to the ground and then shot by a bunch of prickly bullets and started hallucinating. Whose idea was all of that?!" He balled his fists, face fully frowning now.

The man calmly turned around, gold eyes didn't show any fear at all. "Mine."

" _What_?" That made his eyes narrow. "So _you_ were the one behind all of those stupid traps in order to kill me? Well, you've failed in your objective."

A light tap of a button and a vial-like tube popped up from a compartment on the device, and the man stopped his loggings. "I wasn't trying to kill you."

His finger was raised, but the Kaioshin's rage was stymied by that statement. "Huh?"

The gold-eyed man turned around, holding the vial in his hand while looking at him. "I didn't know that you had the ability to speak a human language, and assumed that you weren't somewhat sentient nor were you here for good reasons, but when you started yelling I terminated all of the security alarms."

 _I was yelling?_ He knew he was stating his thoughts out loud, but he didn't think he was yelling. But the man's explanation did not cure the anger in Zamasu and he ended up missing the point. "Oh, so _before_ I started yelling your objective was to kill me, then?"

"Not all at." He was leaning against the table. "I went down there in order to stop you from getting terribly hurt. Your prolonged consciousness was making your state of mind worse with the substances in you."

Once again, Zamasu's anger died down with his confusion and growing intrigue. So this man administered a bunch of attacks on him, only to stop them and keep Zamasu from 'dying', because he didn't know that the Kaioshin was a god. But how the heck did those things manage to make him _hallucinate_? "...It was?"

That's all he could ask, and the man nodded. "I didn't think that your brain was wired the same way as a human's."

 _What?_ Zamasu frowned and scoffed. His brain… akin to a human's? That's gross, that's _hilarious_. "And what made you come up with _that_ conclusion?"

"The substances are made with adaptive neurons that increase the reaction of certain places in the brain. One shot is potent enough to make a human being get really dizzy, lose their footing, wear out their vision, and pass out. It works in the same way as a tranquilizer in that sense." He placed his hands on the edge of the table and lifted himself up to sit. "In your case, there were multiple shots that you took all at once," _Several dozen to be exact_ , Zamasu thought. But how? "And this triggered the same responses as it would a human, but you still managed to stay conscious with it traveling in your brain. Any respiratory input oxidizes your cells and these same neurons feed off of oxidation, so your continuous breathing caused the reactions to go haywire."

The man placed his hands on his lap, answering Zamasu's internal question. "The adaptive neurons, after they fully affect the portion of the body that keeps you awake, will temporarily turn off your respiratory system just to get itself out of the body. You went into a complete coma to accommodate for the hallucinations, but you still kept breathing." He turned around and placed the vial back on a different compartment from where it came from, continuing his work while talking. "That's why I had to put you in that incubator with a supplement that wasn't oxygen, otherwise your hallucinations wouldn't have gone away. You'd probably see… shrinking pink elephants or something, I dunno."

Well, would you look at that; _shrinking pink elephants_. Well, Zamasu's hand was _pink and shrinking_ , and that was just about enough for him. He cringed at the idea of 'waking up' in a rainbow, shrinking-elephant infested world with backwards classical music playing in the background or something. That would be downright creepy. "But what about that weird gravity thing in the hallway I walked through?"

The man stopped. "That was an accident." He turned around with an apologetic smile on his face. "I didn't re-calibrate it, and the settings were a little too high. It was supposed to open up an airlock that would just kinda… blow you out of the entrance, but you teleported out of there in mere seconds."

Wait, that feeling of immobility, and the dangerous chest compression happened in _seconds?_ Zamasu could have sworn that it was much longer than that, at least it felt like it.

The Kaioshin blinked. "Oh…" The man had spoken with no conviction or anything to perpetuate Zamasu's bad temper, the Kaioshin found it hard to continue being angry. Zamasu could obviously see that this guy was strictly a very private person, that much could be said with the way his body language was.

His back was turned to Zamasu, and Zamasu took this time to pay attention to the room, finally taking a step off the bed and looking around him. The walls were the same powder blue color and the floor was tiled, polished white. The room itself wasn't that big; there were computing devices across from him that held records of whatever was in the incubator, and in this case it was him. They had a multi-purpose function other than surveying the incubator; this thing could make vials not known to his knowledge and possibly much more. The Kaioshin had realized that the room had excellent ventilation and was insulated very well, as well as having impeccable lighting. He looked over to the farther side of the room across from the computers to see a window that stretched along the length of the room. The Kaioshin walked over to it, refusing to place his hand on the glass because it was beautifully spotless, and got a clear view of the outside.

Weren't the windows nonreflective when he saw them outside? He couldn't see a thing inside the building from the outside, yet everything outside was crystal clear in his view. That was only a portion of his shock; looking out, he could tell that this room was a hundred or so feet up from the ground, and Zamasu could see almost everything this large place had. He saw the full stretch of the crop circle, which looked much longer than it did in width. The garden walkway not only was beautiful when he was walking through it, but from this view it looked intricate; the middle circle was divided into radial thirds with dashed outlines made by the bushes, which was supplemented with four other circles of equal size that overlapped one another and were centered around the 'corners' of the middle circle. He had caught sight of another large building that wasn't as big as this laboratory, out of which came large, eccentric looking trucks that funnelled in near the plant field. These trucks had lit-up accenting around their grooves, being a shiny clean dark grey hue. They would leave out through a road that mayhaps exited the large opening, and then right after those same people from last night would enter the greenhouse-kempt plant field to replant the crops.

Were those beings human? They moved incredibly fast, they almost looked like they were gliding above the ground at rapid speeds, and were planting at incredibly fast rates. They also seemed to have steel hats on from his view, and light adorning reflective clothing. Zamasu leaned in a bit closer, they almost moved like machines. And speaking of machines, some giant, near transparent dome was shimmering right before his eyes. It encapsulated a large portion of the same building that the trucks came out of. The sun was out, and this large translucent dome started glimmering the same yellow hues as the sun. Still being translucent, it seemed to look like it was diminishing until it had finally dematerialized beautifully. He noticed there were humans or beings, whatever they could be, coming out of that building as well, right after said dome had vanished.

The Kaioshin shook his head, this whole place was utter sorcery.

"... _Where am I_?" He finally popped the question that should have asked primarily a long time ago. Zamasu turned around to look at the man, who had now pressed a few buttons to shut off the system completely.

He answered, in the most casual way possible. "You're in my lab." He turned around, seeing the Kaioshin near the window. "Right outside is where I live."

Zamasu frowned and looked back out the window. "What do you mean 'where you live'? Who are the people that own this entire place?"

"Me."

Zamasu probably had the _dumbest_ dumbfounded look right now gazing at every single portion of this large space outside the window. This laboratory, the large garden, those winged car thingies, the huge crop circle, all of that stuff… owned single-handedly by this attractive man behind him. He whipped around, and gestured with his finger out the window. " _You_ own all of this?"

The man was tucking loose strands of hair behind his ears with slim, dexterous pretty hands. "Yes."

"All those things outside, including this giant building?"

"Mm-hmm." He nodded, still modest about all of this while the newfound information was blowing the Kaioshin's mind. He approached the window to look out as well, and leaned forward to see Zamasu's eyes glued to the amount of things within the vicinity. "Is this what made you curious?"

Zamasu turned just in time to see the man's tilted head, and he cocked his neck back because he wasn't expecting this person to be so close to him. Zamasu looked up and down at his chin… _Are we the same height?_ "Maybe… How in the…" Sweet Kami, his eyes went back to the window and his face became comically confused; he thought Rebecca's house was big, but this was straight up ridiculous.

The man beside him laughed, and it sounded warm and honeylike. Zamasu looked over to see him smiling downwards and- _dammit_ , it was _not_ a good idea to look at that moment. The man's downcast smile accompanied with his laugh made him look childlike, and jovial. He looked back at him and those striking, amused amber eyes caught Zamasu's attention.

Zamasu honestly found the sight truly captivating.

"So," he clasped his hands, making the Kaioshin look down at them, and walked away while taking off his lab coat and hanging it, "Clearly your side effects have worn off completely, so I think I should send you out back to where you flew from."

Zamasu looked at the stature of this man; he had baggy black pants on with the white heeled boots and a round neck sweater that was well fitted on his torso. He had a lean build as Zamasu inferred, the only difference he noticed was in his waist down, and Zamasu found out that he had a sort of hourglass figure. It isn't because he was horridly skinny, as that's how most hourglass figured men would have to be to achieve that look, but he was far from that; the man looked _toned and shapely_ , he had muscle, and certainly very strong legs. It just so happened that those white boots accentuated his look even more. He undid his messy ponytail, Zamasu got a glimpse of his long voluminous hair traveling down to his rear, and then he fixed the ponytail back up again.

The man made his way to the sliding door, which automatically opened on its own, and he looked back to see Zamasu still staring. "You can't just stand there, you know." He beckoned the Kaioshin before taking another step. "Follow me."

Zamasu blinked again, slowly following for a moment and then he realized something; he could feel the floor, his boots still weren't on him. They sat next to the incubator, on top of the device attached to it which Zamasu could have noticed had he not been giving heavy looks at the man who wanted him out. He slid the Kai boots on, and looked back at the man who was waiting patiently. As he exited the room, Zamasu watched him lead the Kaioshin out of this high-tech building. The man in front of him was mostly silent, the only thing that was heard was the aesthetic sound of his heeled boots clicking against the floor, and Zamasu took this time to look around this hallway.

The hallway was quite big, a little too big to be considered a hallway, so he settled for corridor as a better name. The floor was ivory colored and smoothly tiled, and the inner walls this time were a dark grayish-blue tint. They exited the inner corridor and ended up on the same walkway that Zamasu saw earlier. For some reason, the spotless windowed walls _and_ floor were more intimidating than he thought. From this height, he was getting more of a view of this large premise. If he didn't end up in this lab, he could have walked all around this entire place and _still_ would've been mystified.

Then again, this man would've sent weird bubble-shaped nukes at him or something, since he knew where he came from.

Zamasu turned his gaze back to the person in front of him. The Kaioshin was battling the strange urge to talk to him. He'd be lying up his own green ass if he didn't say that this scientist person didn't intrigue him. Even the way he walked caught his eyes, and his ethereal face was enough to make the Kaioshin stare long enough to _force_ himself out of the gaze.

"Do you really own all of this?" It was far too stupendous, he had to ask again.

"Mm-hmm." The man nodded.

His nonchalance contrasted greatly with the thoughts of the Kaioshin. "So… you saw this large place, and you just bought it?"

They had reached the other building from the glass walkway, and stopped in front of some door with glowing buttons that the man had pressed. From what Zamasu knew, this was an elevator. The man turned to look at him and shook his head. "Nope. I made it."

Again, that dumbfounded face was back at it again, as the mind-blown factor within Zamasu grew like tenfold. "You… _made_ this building, and those crop circles, and that garden and…?"

"Yeah." Golden eyes looked straight into Zamasu's, and the Kaioshin had to look away. They were such _beautiful_ irises. "Well, _I_ myself didn't build it on my own. I made a bunch of machines that could do it for me."

That is a really simplified and humble way of saying 'I have the ability to program machines into constructing large places like this'. Zamasu frowned. "You created machines… to build all of this?"

He chuckled. His chuckle was charismatic. "Yes." The light on top of the door they were standing by went off with a light 'ding'. He looked back at Zamasu with an abrupt smile. "I was about to ask if you were afraid of heights but, you flew here, so…"

Zamasu blinked. Every time this man would smile, it made him freaking blink.

The door opened, revealing that same floating rectangle thingy that Zamasu had seen last night. The Kaioshin was suddenly reminded of the fact that many hours had passed while he was out cold. The man and he stepped in, and a floating holographic panel came up for him to press the ground button. They descended, Zamasu staring outside like a wondrous child while the man had his hands against his hips. Once they reached the ground, the door opened into the lobby, Zamasu was reminded of the weird hallucinating experience he had here. It was so profound, that he probably would never forget about it even if he tried. The lobby was actually much bigger than he initially thought it was. The entrance was opened, so they walked out of the corridor that the Kaioshin was definitely-not-really crushed in. Zamasu looked down at the grass path, and back at the man in front of him.

He didn't know who this man was, but he had another feeling that this wasn't going to be the last time he'll find himself here.

"Umm, hello?"

The man was tilting his head and waving his hand with a frown, and Zamasu realized that he was staring at him again. When his attention was brought back, the man gave him a modest smile. "You're out now. It's time for you to go."

His voice was so sweet, even though he was making Zamasu leave the Kaioshin found no reason to rebuke it at all. He didn't even know who this person was, why would he stay here any longer in the first place? He just nodded, the man bid him a kind farewell and with that, Zamasu started ascending off the ground. He watched as this attractive man went back into his large lab, and the Kaioshin looked around the place for a moment before flying southwards.

ψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψΨψ

He decided that he had enough of exploring now, after being caught in a place where he hallucinated. He looked down at the greenery of North City, there has not been a single 'normal' house that he's seen in this large city. Every home was a mansion, and he saw one particular large rustic contemporary that had a very wooden theme to it, and seeing was all he did. Even though its design looked rather amazing and overall _pretty,_ He didn't wanna descend to that particular place and end up getting paralysed from the waist down or something.

Also, he kinda promised Loki that he would return yesterday night, but then he fucked up and it was now nearing the afternoon. Sweet, Gods aren't usually all that great at keeping promises, they already have too much going on in their omni-optic minds.

He could see a portion of Rebecca's house far in front of him, so he zoomed a lot faster through the heart of North City. She lived near the edge of the North, so distinguishing her house wouldn't be that hard.

Technically, every mansion in this city was easily distinguishable. And _big as heck_.

He looked down at her mansion, right now he was floating just a few hundred feet above it. He descended down to where his window was, only to realize that it was closed. Surprising, he didn't remember closing it, but it didn't matter. He just teleported himself straight into his room, and looked over at his neat bed. Yes, he does fix his bed, he's a God and Gods must be neat and tidy all the time. Luckily for him, Rebecca's house was almost always clean, he used to question how she managed to keep this giant place so well kempt, but this was answered when he was quarelling one of those weird circle thingies that tried to vacuum his outer armor. It wasn't funny…

Don't you dare laugh either.

And unlike a certain _someone_ who was busy traveling around the world, her room was just as clean as his. Even Ollie and Loki's rooms were both well kept, but then again those two were raised properly. They weren't messy dogs, the Kaioshin had found that Rebecca barely needed to worry about either one of them because those two would never make a mess in this house. Speaking of which, he wanted to go see them. Zamasu walked out of his room and went to knock on his door- _Zamasu…_ he thought to himself, and closed his eyes calmly.

 _ **You're knocking on a room that belongs to a dog.**_

It was as if he'd expect Loki to jubilantly say 'Come in!' or something. He pushed the door open softly, but Loki's light blue room was empty. The Kaioshin frowned, perhaps they were in Ollie's room, so he went and did the same thing to where they should be residing… minus the knocking on the door, of course. Once again, there was not one canine, the light green room was empty too.

Okay, they were definitely downstairs then. Zamasu went to the stairs and took a few steps down, already hearing the scattered pawsteps of the canine kids in the kitchen. Perhaps he startled them, because the first thing he was greeted with was Loki's suddenly loud and distracting barking. Zamasu frowned, but he thought that this was because he accidentally broke the malamute's promise.

"Loki, I'm sorry I wa-" Zamasu stopped, seeing that Loki was still barking and pacing around the Kaioshin. "Uhh… what's wrong?" The big malamute went back to Zamasu looked up at him silently, and then he barked out of nowhere.

Ollie came out just in time to supplement the noise Loki was making, and Loki ran upstairs without any 'dogmatic' explanation. Before Zamasu could even get a word with either one of them, Ollie started deliberately pulling Zamasu's pants towards the couch, as if wanting him to sit down.

The Kaioshin wasn't budging, instead of following the pug's tracks he just looked down at him. "Ollie, can you calm down? Why are you so energetic today?"

The two were just trying to hide the stupid shit they got themselves into while Zamasu and Rebecca were gone. But Zamasu doesn't need to know that.

Ollie looked up at him, standing on his hind legs and placing his paws against the Kaioshin's leg. At this point, Ollie was practically jumping up and down, running to the couch and back to him. Zamasu raised a brow. "Umm, no. I don't feel like sitting down."

Zamasu started going to the kitchen, because the power of tea is strong, but was stopped by Ollie suddenly jerking his pant leg back with his mouth. He looked down at the pug, whose doey eyes pleaded for him to sit down. The confused green man turned around when he heard Loki rushing back downstairs with a… thing. It was actually a toy piano that worked, and Loki placed it down in front of the Kaioshin. Now, Ollie moved from Zamasu's pants, and it was now Loki nudging him away from the kitchen while Ollie's tiny paws pressed random keys on the piano while he randomly barked.

Yes, this tiny pudgy pug was _singing_ in order to distract Zamasu.

Zamasu was pushed over a bit, and Loki went on his hind legs, now his paws reaching Zamasu's lower chest as he too started singing in his dog language. The Kaioshin was so overwhelmed by the weird serenade these two were giving him, that all questions he had in mind were swiftly wiped out and all he could do was… chuckle? It was so random and out to place that he just laughed at the sight, but was utterly confused as to why they were so frantic. The Kaioshin looked towards the kitchen, just to see if this was the source of their panic. He took a step closer to the tiled area, and this immediately caused Ollie to push the toy piano until it was right in front of Zamasu. Loki ran into the kitchen, and several seconds after he did, a loud spilling sound was heard.

This made Ollie stop playing his super-hot-fire mixtape, and both the pug and the God turned to the source of the sound. Zamasu immediately went in the kitchen to see… _not the best sight to see_ after you've initially thought these two dogs were neat animals _._ There was flour splattered all over the floor, along with a bunch of dog treats and paw marks all around the premise. The floor was also wet near the counter where Loki was standing, and this shy malamute had a large silver bowl on his head. The water was pooled where he was, and Loki was drenched in the water that _should_ have been in the bowl.

Zamasu placed his hands on hips with a cross look growing on his face. He suddenly became paternal. "What took place here while I was gone, you two?"

Loki couldn't see, and his paws couldn't get the round smooth bowl off fast enough, so he was fumbling with it for a few seconds before finally lowering his head and shaking the bowl off. Ollie went to sit in front of Zamasu, as this was something Rebecca would tell him to do when he does a bad thing. Like, chewing and licking random things. He still can't get over that habit.

Loki followed suit to sit side-by-side to Ollie with his head down. Both dogs were taught to exhibit much respect, so barking would be considered talking back. They sat silently as the God before them frowned in annoyance.

"Is this what you two are trying to hide from me?"

They just looked down, sullied moods between the two canines as Zamasu sighed.

"Did you two think that you could fix this on your own before your owner came home?"

Nope. They didn't, but that didn't stop them from trying, and Zamasu could see that. He sighed. "Water would not help with this situation, you know. Why did you do this?"

The intuitive communication between them led to Loki looking back at the treat bag that he and Ollie were previously going for. The Kaioshin looked on to where Loki notioned. From what he could tell, that treat bag along with the flour bag were both on top of the cabinet that they splattered in front of. "So you just wanted dog treats? That's it?"

Ollie quietly whined, as if saying that it was an accident. And it really was, it was a aforementioned miscalculation on their part. Zamasu sighed, and stepped over to the flour and treat mix on the floor. He picked up the treat bag, shaking it to rid off the flour, and then placed it on the countertop. The same was done with the flour bag, he folded the opening and properly placed it so that no flour would fall out, then he turned around to face the large mess. He raised a hand, every flour and treat particle was raised off the ground along with the puddle of water, which was swiftly moved to the sink and poured itself completely after he released it. As for the flour-treat 'cookie mix', he reformed the mess into a sphere and with another hand, the God opened the trash bin on the other side of the kitchen.

The dogs pretty much watched quietly, while being slightly surprised, at how easy this whole cleanup process was. And also, they were still questioning how the flour and the treats ended up getting stuck in the air again.

Zamasu telekinetically dumped all the contents into the trash bin, closed it, and then he finally placed the flour bag on the top of the cabinet. Once he was done, his eyes went back to the two quiet dogs. He took the treat bag and reached in to grab a couple treats while he walked to the cabinet, placing the bag where it once was, and then kneeling down in front of the two with his field hand out.

"Here." The Kaioshin expected their hesitation, but he didn't expect them to just stare at his hand like it had eight heads. "This is what you two wanted, correct?"

They slowly took one each, and Zamasu could place both his hands on his hips. "Next time, you two should wait for me to get something that high for you, so you don't end up making a mess."

This was where Loki looked up at him with a blank expression, for a reason. And Zamasu backtracked. "Okay, I may or may not have been a little _too_ late yesterday- or rather, this afternoon- but that was a one time thing!" He raised a hand like he was talking to a being that can vocally communicate. Loki tilted his head slightly, and then he quietly growled at Zamasu. "I said I was sorry already."

It looks like their once soured mood had gone away, Ollie was already pugging his way to the living room. Listen, Ollie is one of those pugs, and Zamasu figured this some time ago, to had a certain _bop_ to his stroll. That is the word he mentally uses to describe Ollie's walking, _pugging_ ; he'll never say that out loud because why would he? That sounds very informal. Loki actually went outside to shake off the excess water, and when he returned he ate slowly, so he just laid on his side while chewing on his treat in front of Zamasu.

The Kaioshin was very close with Ollie, but there was something special about the malamute before him, and that wasn't only regarding their connection. Loki was quiet and somewhat standoffish on his own most of the time, but once you get to know him, he's not afraid to show you affection. He nearly wrestled Zamasu to the ground when he returned from his _kick-it session_ , and the Kaioshin wasn't expected such a reaction from him. Even that one time Zamasu had thought about Irene, and the second his thoughts were getting too sour, Loki was right there to pull him back. Zamasu didn't realize how intune the malamute seemed to be with his 'dark' mindset, while Ollie was there to bring forth another part of Zamasu' personality that _never_ makes it to the surface.

Technically, the guys and some of the girls were also starting to correlate with that as well; they're unearthing things that Zamasu never taken the mind to deconstruct. That conversation they fell into in the car out of nowhere showed him this, and even his stupid somewhat unreasonable infatuation with Lexi's appearance was unearthing something else as well.

The author ought to _reckon_ some of you are taking that in a sexual way. It's not, don't get too hasty here.

It's funny how Irene was better acquainted with the males in the group, yet living with Rebecca gave him the opportunity to truly meet and talk them. That made him wonder as to _why_ Irene didn't seem to pull her around with him. Well… the main reason for that is because he simply hates her, so why would he have even bothered at the time? _Okay_ , so why didn't she try _harder?_ Oh right, she kind of couldn't, he threatened her enough so that she wouldn't dare ask him to embark on one of her misadventures, even though _yesterday evening_ was a misadventure. So, why was he upset at her then? He just doesn't like _her_ , it has little to do with anything else, and there was particular trait about her that he can't seem to get past.

Irene is so _uncaring_ in the weirdest way possible. She seemed to be raised on a silver, embossed spoon as a child. With Rebecca or Adrian or Jay or, hell, even James, he could see that these people had certain trials and tribulations at some point in their lives, something that required them to test and question things going on around them, hence why they were easily communicable. He could now see that of the five original people he met, Irene probably had the easiest life out of all of them, and to him she doesn't know how to handle that. Nothing bad has ever occurred to her, and she teases and taunts the idea of such because she _thinks_ that nothing bad can feasibly happen to her. Well, just look at how many times she's tested Zamasu's patience, and how needless her get-togethers seemed to be. The woman holds this whiff of air that screams 'I am untouchable' around her, her risque, privileged behavior was annoying as hell, to testify to that.

The only thing that he can see she's having a problem with is her being with James. Her reaction to what he said during that ride at the airport, along with how quickly she changed the subject shows how uncomfortable she is with the idea of something 'falling apart'. Not that he wished any of that, he couldn't care less, but she obviously isn't confident in her relationship with him, and he wondered why. Perhaps James' mischievous side takes a more disgusting turn, and that means breaking the trust of another individual. Although they had quickly gotten along after finding some form of common ground (during one of the car rides, Zamasu found out that James really likes green tea. That's a plus), the Kaioshin can't say he was buddy-buddy with him yet since he's assuming that James is the reason for Irene's uncomfortability.

If Zamasu didn't have any morals, he wouldn't care and he'd probably applaud James for any sort of cheating that he would do to Irene. But he can't, because _any_ form of cheating is deplorable, even if it's done to the person he despises.

He heard the front door open, and Rebecca's voice concurrently. Looking out and into the living room, he watched as Rebecca strolled towards the sofa to take off her blouse, leaving her with a round neck shirt and white pants. The doctor was the phone with someone at the moment, so she didn't immediately greet the Kaioshin.

"...doesn't know a thing about it, but if he did, he would have said something by now!" Rebecca sighed, and then she stopped realizing that Zamasu wasn't in the living room, and that Ollie was eating one of those special treats. She frowned, looking to the kitchen as she could only see a semi-damp Loki lying down and eating the same thing. Zamasu's attractive green head popped out from the kitchen, and she held the phone away from her ear when she looked at him. "Hey, Zamasu."

Apparently, the person on the other end of the phone call knew who he was, because Rebecca said 'yes, he's here.' Zamasu stepped outside of the kitchen. "Hello." The Kaioshin had his hands clasped behind his back. She smiled at him, apologized whilst pointing at her phone, and he nodded.

"I'm talking to Irene by the way."

 _Annnnd_ there goes 60 percent of his mood. "I will not say hi to her."

"I know that." Rebecca went back to her phone conversation. "Zamasu doesn't want to say hi to you." And then the wench put Irene on speaker.

Irene's womanly annoying voice pierced through his ears like a bullet going through someone's colostomy bag. "Aww, why not?"

"Because I hate you." Because of the lack of banter in his life at the moment, he did respond to her because he subconsciously missed what it felt like to argue with someone for no reason.

"Zamasuuuuu," Was Irene doing this on purpose? "You know what? Fine. Be that way then, Rebecca's here anyway."

"Hmmph." Zamasu turned away and started making himself tea. Rebecca looked between him and her phone, and giggled while shaking her head.

"You guys are a really interesting bunch." She said jokingly, removing Irene off of speaker and placing the phone on her ear again. All she got was a laugh from Irene, and a really petty eyeroll from Zamasu.

"Do not make my tea sour with those horrible choice of words." Zamasu turned the stove on and summoned his own godly leaves.

Rebecca smiled at him. "I'm just saying, you guys are cute." Her stupid giggle made him want to throw her into a wall. "You know, Irene's got three weeks until she comes back right?"

" _Do not remind me_." He groaned, and Rebecca smirked. She honestly would miss the company of the Kaioshin when he goes back, but at the same time, she missed the tales that Irene would tell her about the stuff they argue on. Like that one time he got mad at her because her toast didn't have any cinnamon on it, and she rebuked that she didn't like cinnamon in her toast and then… you know how it goes. Just stupid things in general, and Rebecca loved all of it.

Though she wondered if Zamasu would be flying around like he does now when he goes back. She wondered if he'd talk more with the dudes after spending a day at their place, and apparently he might even be able to talk to Lexi in a friendly manner. Key word, _might_. She was certain that even though Irene was more sociable than she was, she'd still let him run around and do what he wants. She should warn the artist about that sometime later, Zamasu is like a curious child who's always running everywhere trying to see _everything_ and rightfully so, if his whole year here is based on learning about human beings then he might as well go ahead and explore the world while he is at it.

Rebecca may sound selfish and she'll admit it again, she hoped he wouldn't go out as much and would stay in her home more often. The only times she can bet on that is when they later train, and that's only for a guaranteed three days unless if she feels extra springy after work. She sighed, it will be something that she'll accept as time passes.

田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田◊田

The flight that Lexi is taking would be a bit longer than she had anticipated, but luckily, she was leaving a bit earlier since her runway was a couple days from now. She could have been a more prepped young woman and left a week earlier, but she wanted to stay in her home country for a bit longer. The model called her boyfriend, who offered to drive her there instead of having her drive on her own.

" _Hey hun, I'm going to leave soon."_

 _She could hear his blink. "Wait, today?"_

" _Mhmm."_

" _I can drive you to the airport."_

" _Jay, I have my own car, and my house is far away from yours-"_

" _I'm driving you to the airport." He didn't leave any room for her to answer. "Get ready, I'll be there in no time. Love you."_

Whether you like it or not, that was an _offer_.

She called her friends, each and every one of them to tell of her departure. Rebecca had told Zamasu had she would leave the country for about a week or so, and he gave her a short 'bye' over the phone. A very short one.

Lexi smiled, as she sat back in her chair. Flying first class is one of her favorite things that come with her sudden rise in the modeling _and_ fashion industry, this probably won't be the only time in the next month that she'll do this. Now that she thought about it, she should try to book a first class flight for her friends during the winter resort.

Sipping on a glass of fruit nectarine, she looked out the window to the clouds below her. They loosely blanketed the sky, and she should make out a few patches of terrain near the ground level of the planet. The plane was right above the large ocean, crossing the center of the five large countries. The geography of this planet is a little different from ours; what we call continents are called countries there, and there are only five of them, so you can imagine that these are some giant countries. The four cities in Tycho span a couple hundred miles each, and Efilia is the largest country in the planet with the highest population.

Efilia has around 12 cities. The one in particular that she's heading to is Lyn, that is where most of the fashion industry situates their highest tiered events. She's been to that city before, and it is quite glamourous that even the civilians show a high sense of fashion. You go there, and pretty much feel hella elegant if you aren't intimidated by even the _normal_ people who walk through the streets, or by the fancy buildings and infrastructure of the entire city. Lexi was well-known in the modeling industry, but she wasn't _that_ much of an archetype. This particular runway would be _overshadowed_ with many of the top models in the world because of how esteemed this particular clothing line is. Well, hell, the same person who happens to be one of the greatest, and the youngest computer scientists and is the richest man in the world also created and owns this clothing line. Not only that, she is doing an exclusive line, which means that most of the guests that actually come to this runway are either famous celebrities, other famous fashion designers, and other coordinators themselves.

If that doesn't intimidate you, then probably nothing will.

Lexi is confident, but the idea itself left her shook. She knew Vivian would be there, so his presence would alleviate any sort of trepidation she would later have. And besides, she had two days; she could just settle after this plane ride in a suite, and possibly stay in Lyn for about a few days after the runway show. She'll make a note to call Vivian once she lands because he's already in the city as she's flying. Hopefully, this event wouldn't become as stressful and challenging as it seems like, the model was anticipating it regardless, and she reckoned it wouldn't be as bad as she overthought it to be.

ΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ

"Let me get a tropical cane smoothie, and a crepe cakette with umm…" The driver turned to the other man sitting next to him, while also addressing the other two males in the backseat. "What do you guys want again?"

"Well, we did say crepe cakettes too." The one next to the driver spoke up. "Make mine chocolate."

"I call red velvet." The man right behind the driver spoke.

"I want tater tots." The other man to the far right of him said.

The driver nodded, and turned back to the drive-thru ordering phone. "So the smoothie, four cakettes, one vanilla, one chocolate and a red velvet one with a small box of tater tots." He then turned around to address another man, who was sitting between the two in the back passenger seat. "What about him, does he want anything?"

The centered man was trembling slightly and he couldn't speak, because there was tape over his mouth, and his face was covered with a bag.

"Oh right, I forgot. He can't uh…"

"Why not get him tater tots too?" The far-right male had a daffy voice. His suggestion was taken by the driver.

"Fair enough." He went back to the ordering stand. "Can you add another box of tater tots, please?"

The person on the other end spoke up. "Alright then, that'll be 35 Zent at the first window. Thank you for ordering!"

And with that, the driver cruised over to the first window. There car was sleek and dark blue, the windows were completely black so no one can see inside of the car. The guy on the far left of the back seats looked to the taped man in the middle and then at the other man on the far left. "You order tater tots every time you come here."

"Why not?" He shrugged. "They taste good."

"Cakettes are the best." The guy in the front passenger seat spoke up. "Just stating facts."

"But cakettes aren't tater tots. You can compare the two."

"I'm not. I'm just saying that cakettes are the best." The front guy smirked.

The driver rolled down his window to give the cash over to the unsuspecting woman at the first window. She couldn't see through the back windows of his car at all. Right before he reached the first window, the man on the right side of the backseat brandished a gun, telling the hostage to keep his mouth shut. This made the guy in the front passenger seat shake his head.

"That's a big gun. You don't need to pull that out in a car, you could have just taken your pistol out."

The gun he was holding was an assault rifle. "It was the closest thing I had."

"Eh." The front guy shrugged, turning around right as the driver rolled his window down to pay. After, he drove to the second window for their order, which they had pretty much got within an instant. The driver thanked the woman in the second window and told her to have a nice night, and with that he peeled into the road. The right-rear male ripped the tape off of the hostage face, which made him yelp out in pain. He then handed the guy the tater tots that they ordered for him.

The silly voiced male blinked at the hostage. "You're not allergic to potatoes, are you?"

"What kind of person is allergic to potatoes?" The driver frowned.

The left-passenger seat man shrugged. "I dunno, I'm just making sure."

The hostage shook his head either way, looking down at the food before speaking with trembling lips. "W-w-why did y-you b-buy me f-food?"

"Your stomach was growling disrespectfully loud while we were on the phone earlier, so you're hungry." The front guy turned around to answer the question, and the hostage shakily nodded.

"This guy looks like he has the shackles." The left-rear guy poked the hostage's arm as he spoke.

"Nah, he's just scared." The driver shrugged it off. "Eat up, dude. We don't have all night."

The hostage quickly abided, both his hands were also tied together so he couldn't have punched either one of the guys in the face. Not like he would either, he was legit held at gunpoint while they ordered _cakettes_. So he opened the box quickly, and pretty much ate quietly while they drove through the outskirts of East City.

"We're actually kinda close. The hideout is a bit too open, don't you think?" The driver looked at the front guy.

The front guy laxed back with his hands behind his head. "We're gonna relocate within the next like… few days or something."

"What about this guy right here?" The right-rear man pointed at the scared, eating hostage.

"He's coming too. He doesn't have anywhere else to go, technically."

The hostage looked up. Suddenly, the emotional influx of the situation made him speak up. "You guys _shot_ my house down!"

"You mean up." The driver corrected him. "You shouldn't be talking so loud."

"Yeah." The assault rifle was brandished again by the right-seat man, who spoke nonchalantly. "If you want, I could just shoot you dead right now. It won't be that much of a big deal, we can get someone else to do what we need to do for us." The hostage shook with fear now, he cowered down again.

"Uhh, you guys." The left-rear man raised a hand. "If you're gonna shoot him, please don't shoot him in this direction. I don't want blood on my tater tots."

"Fine." The right-rear man lowered his rifle, and then turned the hostage. "We do need you, by the way. Our boss would be really upset if you died."

The hostage was back to eating again, he didn't even try to rebuke what they said. The car ride ran rather smoothly, they even passed a police car without any sort of problem because they were all dressed normally. The cops within their car were laughing at something, and they caught sight of the driver, who made eye contact with them at the same time and just waved casually. They did wave back as their police car made a turn, leaving the hostage with no kind of hope to latch onto.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Ohhhh shit, you really think these criminals are running around being completely stupid, huh? Technically, they weren't in a black van, but they are associated with the black vans too. You won't be hearing any more from this hostage...**

 **Well, well well, Zamasu has had his fill of exploring now, he'll be self-quarantined for a while lol. Have you noticed something quite peculiar? The man isn't like other humans who do look at him weirdly, yet Zamasu himself was doing the** _ **same thing**_ **to him. Hmm…**

 **Lexi's got a runway going for her at the moment, guys. You should be lucky enough that she didn't invite Zamasu because he might actually** _ **die**_ **going there and seeing what she'll wear. This chapter was quite dynamic, I had to say. And a bit shorter compared to the previous ones, but it's back on it's normal trek. I'ma see you peoples in the next shit.**

 **By the way, I will use the term pugging more often because it so fitting for Ollie.**


	24. Un-Expectations

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 **Un-Expectations**

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It was in the morning once more, two days after Zamasu had returned from that _place_ where he was damn near abducted, and here he was sitting in his room reading the book in his hand.

Except he wasn't reading it. He wasn't even flipping any pages anymore. He was thinking, he was wanting, he was curious.

You would think that being caught red handed walking through a restricted area and ending up with projectiles injecting weird substances in you would make you not want to go back to that particular place. But something that lingered in the back of Zamasu's really messed up head ever since that incident said ' _Hey, why not go there again?_ ', and it's been growing and gaining influence in his mind with every hour that passes. There was so much to look at in that place, a part of him even wondered if he had somehow fell into some invisible portal and ended up there because that place was _surreal_.

He wasn't a masochist, he didn't want his mentality to be impeded on, but he wanted to _see_ … things. He didn't really know what he wanted to see but he just had a strong feeling of going back there again. You ever wanted to go somewhere and you don't even know why you want to in the first place? The Kaioshin knew better than to step into that large laboratory again, wandering around the area would suit him better since there was no gravity changes outside of that building. Rebecca wasn't home, and Loki and Ollie were doing their daily dog things in their own rooms, so he could just leave now. He could go for thirty minutes and come back without a hitch-

Wait, Zamasu stopped himself. _Why am I so infatuated with this human's home_? Sure it looked beautiful, but _no_ , he shouldn't be wanting to be somewhere where some human that he doesn't know is. Is that man even human? How does a being from such a disgusting species managed to look, and be, so captivating? And how did he live in such an area at such a young age? To be fair, the man looked young, like much younger than even Rebecca who was the second youngest in the group, second to Ashley. Perhaps he was an adolescent, maybe. But either way, Zamasu should not be waltzing around a place he doesn't belong in. It's not even respectful as a Kai, no reasonable Kai would just end up trespassing a restricted place, and Zamasu is the most reasonable person you could ever meet.

Meanwhile, he was stepping out of his window again, questioning his interest for this place, and his overall sanity.

He flew out, rising above Rebecca's place, passing through North City and to the upper north forest portion of Tycho. He looked down carefully, the forest was freaking huge, and at this height he hoped he wouldn't end up missing the place. He actually didn't, because this area was _much bigger_ than he thought; it didn't dwarf the size of the surrounding forest but it was _big_ , perhaps a few miles across.

So this place _was_ real. Okay, good.

He lowered himself down, away from that beautiful garden walkway, and nearing the large platform where one of those 'winged car thingys' sat. He frowned, he saw two when he came here before, this one in particular was the one behind the reflective-red jet. When he touched ground, he looked around, turning to the actual jet and realizing the _sheer size_ of this giant wing car. He had _never_ seen anything like it; it was actually fifty feet or more in length, its wings were curved inward as an aerodynamic perk for its resistance because it was a resistance jet, and there were two propulsors in between the rear wings. The accenting of this jet was phenomenal, it was a shiny goldenrod hue that seemed to shimmer as Zamasu approached it. The glass was semi-reflective and looked quite strong, it was also accented with the gold around the jet. This one wasn't like the other one, as it was bigger, and there were glass windows on the side of the private jet which showed that this vehicle had a lounge room inside.

 _By Kami_.

What if… what if he were to teleport in there? He could see a portion of it, so he could probably just- _no no, stop it. Stop yourself right this instant_. How disrespectful was he? Teleporting into someone's property, that's preposterous. If Gowasu heard about this he would get castigated for _sure_. He wiped the idea out of his head, and turned around to see the crop field that he'd seen before. He slowly flew from the sleek platform and moved a bit closer to see what was in that place.

By the high heavens, the workers in that field weren't even _human!_ They were automatons, moving at extremely fast paces and being amazingly efficient at checking, harvesting, and replanting the fruits and vegetables. Zamasu just levitated there watching the spectacle. _Incredible_.

He lowered himself down finally, seeing that there was a small building behind where he was. This was the same house that he saw from afar, and he realized how stupid it was to compare this place with Rebecca's; her house dwarfed this one. The abode was small and looked very futuristic, there was a well-kept, beautiful garden surrounding the home. The house was mostly white, save for the second floor's exterior walls which were a light yellow, and the design wasn't like the houses he seen so far; the patio itself was rectangular and white, two stairsteps that led up to it because it was a raised platform, and it had a couple white leisure chairs in it. The first floor had a black glass front wall, with was reflective, Zamasu could see the inside of it. The interior of the first floor was minimalistic; there was this device on the far right, coupled with two white couches, a _floating_ coffee table (or at least it looked like it was floating to Zamasu), and black stairs that led to the second floor which didn't have glass walls at all. There was a big window, Zamasu would see the office room inside of there had he levitated a dozen feet above the ground, the desk was black and the carpeting was white, but the accents and the accessories in the room were mostly yellow.

Zamasu blinked, he glanced over momentarily to the car that was parked on the side road next to this house, and went back to looking and inadvertently walking around the patio. The glass on that car was nonreflective and black, and the vehicle itself looked expensive and was a racecar yellow color. The cars propulsors were facing outwards when parked with yellow rims around and inside the black propulsors. This particular vehicle was a low-riding two-seat car, and by low-riding meaning that the model itself was meant to be low, so the seats were reclined back more than a normal car seat would be. Apparently, there was a person in the car, because the door facing away from Zamasu opened, and out stepped the driver of the vehicle.

The individual closed the car door, which alarmed Zamasu for a moment because the entire place was relatively silent. They were carrying a glass tablet with silver handles on the side of it, and the left handle had a tablet pen for writing. They strolled around the side of the house and the grass garden before ending up in front of the patio _just in time_ for Zamasu to turn around and see them.

Zamasu blinked like ten times. The individual in front of him wasn't a human, they resembled the automatons he saw in the crop circles, only this one was different. This one was built like a human male; it had two legs, two arms, two feet… you get the gist, but its body was metal. It also had white arms that were plated with yellow on his outer arms, and his hand was mostly yellow with its fingers (save for his thumb) being completely yellow. The individual's torso was white, his legs were also white, and his neck had somewhat exposed yellow mechanics that looked spot-clean and well kept. His face was also a clean white, eyes were shiny glossed blue, and he had a yellow hat that completed his look.

This was an awkward moment for the both of them. Zamasu just stared at him, and he stared at Zamasu, and they both just… stared at each other. Then the AI in front of the God frowned, and Zamasu cocked his neck back in shock, realizing this thing had artificial facial muscles.

"Umm…" The AI's voice didn't sound monotonous; his voice was masculine, very clear and rather composed. And it sounded so spot-on humanlike that it shocked the Kaioshin. "Good morning…?"

That was all the AI said before lowering the tablet in his hands along with his arms, until they were at his sides. Zamasu slowly nodded. "Good… morning."

The AI raised a brow while pointing at Zamasu, articulating. "Do I... know you? Is there a… meeting or appointment that I don't know about?"

That first question wasn't a question. The AI asked it in conjunction with the second one because the only reason Zamasu should be here is if he knew him, or if there was some business the God had with him. "I was here… looking around." He was being honest for the moment. Zamasu really didn't solely know why he was here.

"Looking around." He said with a slight nod as he stood a bit straighter. "You just somehow _happened_ to be here? Nobody is able to permeate through this place while Mr. Sarashina is gone."

 _So that man's last name is Sarashina_. That was what Zamasu could gather, that male seemed to be the only human living here. He gave the same response that he gave to that man. "I flew here."

"You flew here?" The AI asked.

"Yes."

The AI turned his head around to the left, then he turned all the way around, and then he turned again to face Zamasu. "Where's your spaceship?"

"No. I _flew_ here. Like, _I_ flew." Zamasu pointed to himself.

The AI cocked his neck back slightly. "Well, that's new." Zamasu was _very_ surprised that he was having a lenient conversation with some metal specimen that resembled a member of the human race.

He nodded, and the AI crossed his arms with the tablet on the side of his chest. Zamasu raised his hand. "Wait." He slowly pointed at the AI. "You're not… human."

The AI blinked, or what looked like blinking because his blue eyes momentarily disappeared, and he looked down at himself. Then, he looked back up with a nonchalant vibe. "Indeed."

If there was a word that Zamasu would use to describe this individual in front him, it would be _blasé_.

"How are you…" Zamasu pointed up and down at him, and the AI answered plainly.

"Technology has been skyrocketing in the past three decades so…" Then he gestured to himself from his chest down to his feet, as if showing the Kaioshin that he was the result of said technological advancement. Zamasu slowly nodded, and the AI started to walk towards him, and the Kaioshin noticed that even his walk was impeccably humane. It was… crazy to see such a thing, and to hear such a thing speak in such a way. He can't even call him a thing anymore, because Zamasu could see the AI had a high sense of individualism. That itself, is impressive overall.

The AI passed Zamasu, going straight for the building behind him. Zamasu raised a brow and turned around. "You're entering his house?"

"This is my house." The AI turned around and plainly said. This just _adds_ to the whole mindblown factor that Zamasu had in tow of being here.

"So… you live in your own place? You're not living with uhh…" Zamasu gestured with his thumb backwards. "The machines over there?"

That, to the AI in front of him, sounded mildly disrespectful, but he let it slide. "Well nope. When Mr. Sarashina is gone, I co-manage everything here. I'll assume that you were actually looking for him instead." Zamasu _kind of was_ thinking of seeing the man again for _questions_. He placed his hand on the glass, and it pulsed a yellow color. Then, the seamless flush pulsing portion of the glass wall slid open. "If you were, he left the country yesterday."

Zamasu blinked, and then he frowned. "How did he leave so quickly? There is no airport around here." The nearest airport from this place was in West City and that's already hundreds of miles from this place.

"Uhh…" The AI pointed to the platform, and Zamasu turned around. "Jet."

He blinked for a really long time. "That's what those winged cars are called?"

The AI blinked again, but this blink was more of a ' _how do you not know what that is'_ blink. "Yup."

So this man owned and could _fly_ a jet on his own? Zamasu shook his head in shock, there is _no way_ … "Oh." That's he could say, and then the AI fellow fully stepped in his house but kept his hand on the glass wall to leave it open.

"Yup. So if you're just looking around, then I don't think I could allow that, because Mr. Sarashina does not like intruders." He spoke so leisurely that it almost offended the God more than if the AI batted an eye at him.

"I'm not breaking anything." Why was he trying to defend staying here? Zamasu _knows_ he shouldn't be here, and frankly he didn't know why he was here in the first place. But he will have to admit it... "I find this place very… intriguing."

"I can see that." The AI said, about to turn around. "This area is kinda out-of-bounds. Has he seen you before?"

The same thing the man, or Mr. Sarashina, had said. "Well yes."

"Oh, really?" He turned his body back to Zamasu. "So this isn't the first time you've intruded?"

"I was walking through the forest and I _stumbled upon_ this premise." Zamasu crossed his arms. "It wasn't on purpose."

"But this is." The AI smirked, he got him on that one. "You don't have any business with him at all, I assume. What'd you do here at that time?"

The Kaioshin was being straight up honest, as he figured this AI could understand what he was about to say. "I walked through his lab, and got shot and started hallucinating and then he took me to this room while I was unconscious and asked me a lot of questions." The AI didn't look confused at all, but he did cock his neck. "And then afterwards, I left."

"Huh." The AI nodded. "Note to you, which I certain you've known right now; don't walk into his laboratory unless you're _allowed_ to."

"I know that."

The AI shrugged. "Well, that pretty much goes for this entire premise here, so… you gotta _skidaddle_ , man."

"Skidaddle?"

"That closely means 'exit this place'."

Zamasu sighed. Now, he actually _wanted_ to stay and look around, but it was so unethical to do this. Not to humans of course, but to his species; they don't trespass like this. And this AI male is still standing by his glass door waiting for Zamasu to leave. The Kaioshin's curiosity was locked in ties with his rigidity, which was losing its luster.

"I have to go do some logging for his company and then some. I can't stand here all day."

Zamasu looked back at him. "Fine. I'll leave." He will, indeed, but he _will_ come back within a few days when that Sarashina man is back. Why, you may ask; he has questions, perhaps.

"Okay. Bye." With that, Zamasu started to float upwards, levitating very slowly. Right before he did so, the AI went back into his home, and went upstairs to his office room. He sat behind the desk, placing the tablet on a stand, and he looked back at the Kaioshin. The AI casually waved, and with that, Zamasu power boosted out of the area.

Π

Zamasu traveled a little further from Rebecca's house. From the height he was at, he could see Irene's home, and so he just teleported straight into her living room, the pale green wall greeted him once more. Suddenly a feeling of nostalgia, despite only being out of this place for a bit over a week, hit him; the arguments, the food, the hate, the annoyance, the stupid woman that owned this place. It came back all at once, and he realized how closed off he used to be. He spent _three and a half whole months_ in this house without going anywhere, and now that he's getting a glimpse of how _big_ this world is, he could imagine the amount of things he could see in that time. Well, hell, he saw an amazing place, went to some random hospital, became friends with the three guys of the group, and went to a gun shop and met this one woman all in a few days-

Shoot, he had _just_ realized that he had forgotten that thing he had with Nousha. He went to the house phone that Irene had which was sitting on a stand by the TV. He grabbed the phone and typed the numbers that his godly memory stored for him throughout the past few days: _one, seven, four eight nine four, eight seven six… twenty two…_

He waited for a moment before pressing the call button, realizing that working this phone was much more simpler than the phones that he seen with the other adults. The sound of ringing was heard two times before it abruptly stopped.

"...Hello?"

Nousha had answered. "Hello, Nousha."

He heard a sound of intrigue. "Oh, hey God guy. How you've been?"

Zamasu blinked. "You recognize my voice?"

A laugh on the other end. "Of course I'd recognize your proper ass voice!" He heard some shifting as well as a faint male voice which Nousha addressed briefly. "Can you stop being so loud up there?!"

Zamasu heard the male voice say something along the lines of 'I'm by the stairs, asshole' or something like that. Nousha apologized. "Sorry, that was just my brother."

"Okay." The Kaioshin plainly said.

"So you're calling about something, right?"

"Yes." Zamasu said. "You did say we were going to a certain place, didn't you? Or did you forget about that?"

"Oh, I didn't forget about that." He could _hear_ her smirk. "When do you want me to come pick you up? You know, for safety reasons."

She was already taunting him. He smirked. "Where is your house?"

"What?"

"Where is your house? I can teleport there."

"Umm- alright, bye then-" Nousha addressed her brother on the other end, because he was leaving. "It's in West City, like at the edge of it. Not in the heart of the city. How are you even gonna teleport here?"

"What does your front door look like?"

There was a pause. "Umm… it's brown..."

Zamasu shook his head. " _Very descriptive_ , human."

"You know what- fine." He heard shuffling, followed by the opening of a door seconds later. "It's brown with silver horizontal lines on it. Descriptive enough?"

"Quite." Was all he said, he could work with that. "Perfect, then I will be at your place exactly a week from now."

He heard her door close. " _Just_ one week away?"

"Yes." He needed time, to at least spend with the dogs because he had realized that his exploration urges are making him quite neglectful of them. "You can't make the cut for that, woman?"

"I can more than cut it. Don't get sly with me." Nousha said, but she still retained her playfulness regardless. "You ought to come like sometime before the evening. I can't see your pseudo magical powers in the dark."

Zamasu groaned. "They're not _pseudo_ \- you know what, I'll wait until next week to prove it to you. _Right in your face_."

"I'll be anticipating that, green guy. I'll see you then." She sat back down where she was when she answered his call. " _Bye_."

"Bye." And with that, they both hung up, Zamasu smirking down at the phone. Oh, he'll show her alright, that woman will get _more_ than an eyeful of his divine power. And he had just about enough time for that as well. The Kaioshin's eyes trailed to Irene's kitchen, and he was reminded of those chocolate bars that were in her fridge. Before she had left, she brought another batch of them and told Zamasu that while they were walking through the airport. She did say that when she'd return he would be able to have some since her house would be locked, but _nothing_ is locked to a _God_ so…

Almost instantly, Zamasu rapidly opened the chocolate bar and took a savory bite out of it without a second thought. He sat on the counter table's stool, with six bars right in front of him which wasn't a lot. The pack she bought had eight bars in total, he only took like 75 percent of that total. That's not a lot.

He sat there for quite some time, just eating the chocolate bars and enjoying life because they taste hella good. Well, not as heavenly as that chocolatier box Lexi gifted him, but it's still _amazing_. Especially because Irene wasn't here to badger him as well, and afterwards he could just go back to where Ollie and Loki are. Speaking of which, he should eat quite quickly so that he can head back, they are probably wondering where they went.

Actually, no they're not.

Ollie and Loki were too busy running around. Ollie was bolting from his room to Loki's room with the fluffy building blocks they play with all the time. The two were trying to build a wall, this particular wall was situated in Loki's room. The pug had already brought in the bag of blocks, but some of them had fell in his room so he would go back and forth carrying one and dropping it off in Loki's room, while Loki would take a block and stack it onto the wall they made. This wall stood as tall as Loki could reach if he stretched himself upwards without getting on his hind legs.

It took quite a while before the last block was placed. Loki moved away from the wall that centered Ollie's room, and gave off a loud bark that let the other know that the wall was ready. Loki went to his door and opened it fully, as it was was only cracked open for Ollie to dip in and out. With that, Loki stepped back and away from the block wall, and Ollie poised himself on the opposite wall of Loki's room. The pug let out a yip, then ran full speed back into his room, bull-charging the block wall with his pudgy body. The blocks went flying, and Loki barked in pure entertainment.

"What in the world is happening in there?"

Zamasu had arrived several seconds ago, and the only thing he heard was the sound of a lot of things hitting a carpet floor and really loud barks. So he stepped out into the hallway, already detecting the source of the sound to be from Ollie's room. He walked in front of the room, seeing a bunch of blocks on the floor and Loki looking up at him with his tongue out. The pile of scattered blocks shifted, and Ollie's tiny pudgy head popped out. The pug looked up at Zamasu with the same excited face that Loki was adorning.

Sometimes, Zamasu hated when cute things pulled at his heartstrings. Even though it happens practically every day, you'd think the Kaioshin would get used to it, but you can never get _used to_ adorableness.

"Oh." He chuckled. "Well, good morning to you both."

Ollie pugged his way out of the pile, going up to his hind legs and placing his paws on Zamasu's pants again. He looked down at the pug, and then knelt down to pick him up. Loki approached the two just as Zamasu was speaking to Ollie and hooking him under his left arm. Apparently the malamute thought that he was still a lap dog, so he nudged Zamasu to pick him up too.

"Uhh…" Zamasu looked at Loki, who was trying to get under his right arm. It's not like he can't pick up the malamute, it's just that the imagery would be really… strange. Loki was about as tall as Rebecca when standing on his hind legs, and right now the malamute looked into Zamasu's eyes and the Kaioshin gave in again. "Alright."

He held the two in each arm, walking down the stairs and taking a glance at the analog clock on the wall. Rebecca should be arriving home about half an hour from now, and the dogs didn't have breakfast yet. He knew obviously, because Rebecca came into his room to bid him farewell, as she figured he would end up taking up making breakfast for her canine children. Well, he did it a few times so far, and he's been here for more than a week. They can fetch food for themselves, but it's nice to have someone make you breakfast every once in awhile, even if you don't have to.

To be fair, Irene did it for him everyday, and she didn't have to either. That doesn't concern the Kaioshin at all.

"What do you two want to eat?" Zamasu entered the kitchen and placed the two dogs on the tiled floor. He took out the same dog recipe book that he uses, and flipped through the pages whilst showing the two the various foods. They picked a different thing each, and Zamasu stood up finally and brandished his amazing chef skills once again.

Yup, this was what Zamasu did most of the time, minus that day he spent teleporting everywhere, and this morning. It's not something that he was supposed to accept, but rather being in the company of the two animals was something he came to enjoy. The forbidden event of him getting high was also something he came to enjoy, all these actions of eating and watching movies are things he came to enjoy, and he'll admit it himself. It will take time, much time for him to take a seat and to do the same thing for the actual people who exposed him to all of this…

But he'll find that there won't be enough time in the near future.

۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵º۵

The backstage of the runway show… looked like a panicky, scrambled mess of nothing but anxiety.

There were models running all about, and Lexi would end up stopping and looking at most of them as they passed by her. Every single one that had passed by her were _supermodels_ , each with caliber that they individually hold and were no-doubt multimillionaires. They were also globally renowned names as well, and not like Lexi herself wasn't one either, but she wasn't a AAA-list one like most of these women were. With every minute that passed, Lexi noticed that the models were talking amongst each other more, and they were also walking in more of a hurry.

The show doesn't start until about twenty five minutes from now, and everything was prepped up so far. But they all seem to be going to one specific area. Lexi stood up, she was wearing an under-bodysuit and panties with no shoes on. She grabbed the robe that she was allotted to wear, and put it on while walking and turning to corner to the open area behind the runway's entrance, which is where they line up to walk out and come back in. There was a dividing wall between the backstage and the open runway so that people won't see the inner workings of this show, and apparently there were a bunch of these affluent models huddled up where the closed curtains were. They were being really careful collectively, which was amusing, because none of them managed to fall onto the runway itself. They were all trying to see something outside.

A model she knew very well was walking over to where she was. Her name was Giselle, she paused in her stroll when she noticed the other models nearly shoving each other by the closed curtains. One of the co-coordinators came up to clear most of the crowd of women, and some of them did leave while the others got a chance to take a gander outside. Then, another person came by and pretty much announced that they must go and get ready quickly, some of them didn't have their makeup done, and the woman quickly scattered but they were also giggling and chatting amongst each other in excitement. That same excitement was quickly turned into haste again, and within seconds there were women and makeup artists running about like crazy people attending to multiple things at one. Giselle blinked, and then turned to Lexi.

"This is hectic." Lexi looked around the large dressing room, where all the models would prepare themselves for the runway. "This whole thing is fucking hectic."

As a model herself, she's been to several runways but she's never seen so much _bustling_ for a fashion show in her life. The main coordinator wasn't even with them at the moment, a few of the co-ops were, and they were relatively cool-headed before. But now, in Giselle's earlier wise words, they are _rushing them out of their asses_.

"I know this _is_ a top-notch brand we're walking for, but geez…" Giselle shook her head. "It'd be nice to cut us some slack."

"Especially because the show doesn't start until another fifteen minutes." Lexi turned around and looked at her face; she had makeup on indeed, cat eyes and burgundy lipstick. "Everyone within our vicinity is pretty much done at this point, the only thing we need is our assigned clothes."

"Hey wait, look." Giselle pointed to the opening that many of the returning models, there were _still_ some of them returning there, seemed to be looking through. It is so surprising that they were looking through the actual exit to the walkway and haven't actually toppled over one another with how _fiendish_ they seemed to be looking outside.

Lexi raised a brow. "Why are they all rallied up?"

Giselle shrugged, "I honestly don't know." One of the co-coordinators came up to Giselle, telling her that 'she needed to ready ASAP', in his words of course. Giselle sighed. "We'll talk later, hun. I'll see you on the floor." 'The floor' is the term many models used for the runway. Lexi waved goodbye at her, and she was left alone to look over her makeup once more. The model tilted her head, however, as she looked at the crowd of supermodels and models alike.

Lexi shook her head, confused, until she looked to the right and noticed someone entering through a side door. The male had makeup on and conservatively glossed lips and he was damn near running to where Lexi was. "Vivian! Why are you back here?"

"Heyheyheyhey-Lexi, listen," he waved rapidly, already sounding like he was in some sort of rush. "First of all, I got good news, and I got _incredible_ news."

Amanda looked at him. "Really?" Lexi raised a brow. "What is it?"

"Okay so, good news; me, Kiran and Shona are indeed here. Kiran is like in the middle somewhere and Shona is in the front row, sitting next to me. And also, I know you are worried about how I got here so clean. I'm not strutting in illegally; I talked with your coordinator, he knows me of course, and I've seen this whole process already so it doesn't really matter."

Lexi's eyes lit up as she sat back down in her seat. "Oh, that's great! I thought Shona had a tight schedule or something."

Vivian shook his head. "Oh naw, dude wasn't busy at all. And I think you're one of the few models here who has her own clothing line."

"What?! I thought most of them here had one, this show has nothing but some of the most famous models!" Lexi was shook basically, and Vivian looked at her.

"I was honestly shocked to hear that as well." Vivian agreed. "And they're all rich beyond belief. They'll get paid _hella_ money after this issue is over."

 _Just as I thought._ " _Shit_ , and what's the incredible news? And who is the main coordinator talking with?" Lexi was now leaning against her cosmetics table. The coordinator himself _should_ be with the others back here.

"Okay… I was about to get into that..." Vivian got real close and serious, taking a deep breath. "You have to promise me you won't go crazy."

"What do you mean?"

"Promise me you won't go crazy, because I know you, if I tell you this you're gonna go nuts."

Lexi raised her arms. "I don't even know what you're about to tell me! Just go ahead, I won't go crazy." Vivian gave her a hard look, and she reiterated herself. "I'm serious, I promise!"

Vivian cracked a nod. "Fine. So you know the brand you guys are adorning tonight right?"

Lexi nodded. "Yeah, it's Ambrose's." Then she shrugged. "I've gotten over that already. What about it?"

"He's here."  
Vivian didn't even pause to say those two words, and the model just blinked at him twice. "What?"

Vivian repeated himself. "He's here."

Lexi looked to the side, registering the weight of those two words he just told her. She slowly started shaking her head. "Don't fuck with me."

"I'm not."

"Don't you fucking play games with me, Viv-"

"I'm being serious- look just- come here. Come." He beckoned her towards the side door where he entered from. When she reached Vivian, he cracked the door open allowing her to see the audience. This particular door was raised and had a stairway, so anyone in the front rows could be easily recognized. She saw Shona, who was speaking with some other celebrities and smiling. She swears that this man's teeth could shine from across a city, he has a beautiful charming smile. Coupled with his hair that was let loose and tousled, like his trademark appearance. Kiran wasn't in the front rows, the seats themselves were lined up so that they surrounded the sides and the front of the runway, she was speaking with other celebrities too. The seat next to Shona's right was empty, so she assumed that was where Vivian sat.

It didn't take long for the both of them top spot the person the fashion designer was talking about; the said multi-trillionaire was indeed right there, _in the flesh_ , wearing a nicely fit burgundy dress shirt that wasn't buttoned all the way, which showed his neck and the swarovski crystal necklace he wore, and black slacks. The man had vibrant, captivating eyes and his long hair was in a bun. His two giant bodyguards were sitting as well, one was sitting to the right of the man, and the other was sitting next to the person that was _supposed_ to be backstage. Ambrose himself was sitting, like many others in the audience, and the coordinator of the entire fashion show was speaking to him.

When she pinpointed where he was, the model made this shrill strained sound, which Vivian pulled her from the door and held her mouth. Lexi's eyes went wide and she held the hand away from her mouth and looked at the fashion designer. "No… no no! Why would you do this to me?!" She held both of Vivian's arms and nearly started shaking him.

He did the same thing. "I figured I'd tell you so that you don't walk out and just _freeze_ in the middle of the runway when you accidentally make eye contact with him!" He released the woman. "It's even worse for you guys; he's sitting right in front of the runway too. _Front row_."

Lexi could pop a blood vessel in front of him. _"What are the fucking odds?_ " The brunette shook her head. "This is the first time he's been to a fashion show, right?"

"Nope, he's attended a few before, but _no one_ knew that he'd show up tonight, I think the coordinator kept it as a surprise or something. That's why he's been out there, and I imagine you guys are being put in rush hour now after seeing his presence." Vivian looked at Lexi, who looked like she was on the verge of fangirling again. "Look, I'd rather you _don't_ scream right now."

"I'm not gonna scream. It's just that I've never seen him in person, I've always seen pictures and watched interviews but _holy shit_ …" Lexi went back to the door just to peek out again, and the she retreated. " _He looks nine thousand times hotter in person_!" Her hands were on her head. "How is that even _possible_?"

Vivian shook his head. As gay as he was, you can't imagine he wasn't inwardly sharing the reaction as her. "I dunno, dude. I dunno. But… ooh, this isn't the first time I've seen him in runway shows but today I actually got the courage and the balls-quite literally-" Lexi whipped her gaze back to Vivian, "To go up to him, and introduce myself."

"You did?!" Lexi nearly yelled, and Vivian held his finger over his mouth to tell her to quiet down.

"Yes, girl. He smiled and said that he knew who I was." Vivian started fanning himself vaguely. "It sounds stupid, I know. But-"

"He _knew who you were!_ That's not stupid!" Lexi shook her head. "Geez, this is… this is too much to handle."

"My heart just…" He made motions with his hand to symbolize how fast it was beating at that moment. "Well, to be fair, this is _the_ runway show of the year. We don't have shows like this all the time, it happens every like four years." Vivian said, with a slight twinge of his bottom lip. "This is your _first time_ in this global-esque show, too. I'm proud."

"Aww, thanks." Lexi smiled brightly. She looked back at the supermodels running about and getting ready, and then her gaze went downcast towards the floor. "Watch me fall and bust my ass." Lexi was looking outside again. "I don't think I could _live_ being even _ten_ feet away from him." To add insult to injury, the runway's edge was only a few feet away from where Ambrose sat.

"No, don't say that. You are gonna be amazing tonight, I know it." Vivian started going into a more tough-love persona. "And you _better_ , because from what I've heard from other designers and managers and have seen, he is _very fucking critical_. Like, all models do their absolute best to avoid his eyes because he sits there and looks like he's calculating your every move, it's intimidating. I mean, that's no shade to him but… that's how people treat it."

"Well _thanks_." Lexi's hand hit her thigh after she rose it. "That _totally_ helps."

"I try my best." Vivian smiled. "He looks hard to impress, to be fair. Some issues here aren't his, but how the coordinator put this up so far looks snazzy. I imagine Ambrose is gonna be very fucking busy right after this because many people would want to advertise and catalogue his issue."

Lexi took a deep breath. And Vivian placed his hand on her shoulder. "Bitch, don't give me that slumpy attitude. You _know_ you'll do great, and I know you will too." Vivian looked past her to see that many of the models had their clothes on. "I think it's time for me to leave before I end up spoiling myself." He chuckled, and looked back at her. "You'll be fantastic, trust me."

Lexi nodded. "I can feel it, thanks man." She can _pretend_ that she could feel it, just about until her usual confidence boosts itself back up. Vivian gave her a sweet hug, and returned back outside to speak with the other fashion designers while Lexi went back to her dressing room. She had enough time to prepare, as she wasn't going to be one of the first models to strut. One of the clothing managers knocked against the wall of her room, and came in to give her the first thing she'd wear. She took the deepest breath she could muster.

The garment she was given was actually a glittery blue full bodysuit with a mid v-neck. The glitter effect itself wasn't like normal glitters, they were _angled_ in a way to give off an either lightened or darkened blue hue of the entire body suit, and their placement was intricate as well. They were arranged in a way to _suit_ the curvy fit body type, which is body type Lexi had. There was a gold chain attached around the waist area of the bodysuit, with a mix of anchor and belcher type chains along with two smaller complimentative chains above. It was also meant to hug the body and show off the figure. With the sudden pressure she had, like many other models, wearing _this_ in front of an audience filled with other fashion designers, producers, coordinators, celebrities, and a fucking _multi-trillionaire_ was nerve racking. Another deep breath, and Lexi took off her robe to put this outfit on.

Vivian crossed his legs together as he watched the lavished audience around him. This was going to be _big_ , pretty much _all_ the various big names were now sitting and talking with one another. He turned to Shona, tapping the side of his arm. "Hey," the superactor turned to Vivian, "How much are you betting that the next movie you're in will require you to wear that suit?"

Said suit that Shona was wearing was dark burgundy red with black dress pants and black loafers, and smooth to the touch. He had a black handkerchief in his breast pocket, and his dress shirt was actually an ivory white v-neck, with embroidered designs all over it. It was kind of a way to make up for not wanting to wear a dress shirt. Shona looked down at his outfit. "If they do, I'd be upset. I'm a martial artist, I wouldn't want to fight in this attire."

"That's quite understandable. It looks go- wait…" Vivian looked closer at the v-neck shirt underneath, realising the intricacy behind such a simple article of clothing. "Is that shirt from _his_ brand?"

Shona knew who he was talking about automatically. "I didn't know he was going to be here!" The martial artist actor shrugged. "Otherwise, I _would have_ greeted him myself, but it would be weird to go up to someone while wearing clothing from their brand."

That is true. But at the same time from the four seconds of interaction Vivian had with Ambrose, he knew the guy was rather nice. "You might as well just go up and do it now before it starts. This is a _blue moon_ type of thing you don't just catch Ambrose out in the streets, he's rarely out in public to everyone's knowledge."

"So he's a shiny?" Shona chuckled. "You know what, I might _just_ go." He crossed his arms confidently, but the actor didn't move from his seat. Vivian blinked and paused, expecting Shona to get up, but he didn't.

"Oh for fucks sake, just _go_!" Vivian nudged him a little, and the actor frowned at him.

"Fine!" The accented man finally stood up, fixing his suit and seeing that the man next to him, the coordinator was done talking with him, and just got up to shake his hand. The guy looked really surprised to see Ambrose here, but he shook the trillionaire's hand as if it was some platinum-plated trophy to do so. Vivian watched the actor walk over to the where Ambrose was sitting, those bright eyes looked up when Shona approached him. The fashion designer noted how the trillionaire beautifully smiled up at him, he was cordial with everybody, Vivian couldn't see Shona's face and he imagined the actor to be well composed. They spoke for a bit longer, and then Shona bid him farewell, turning back to where the fashion designer was sitting, and smirking.

Shona had a confident look and gait as he went back to his seat, but the second he sat down his eyes were a bit widened, and he took the biggest exhale of his life which made Vivian sit up. "See? It wasn't that bad."

"I have never seen anyone so good-looking _up close_." Shona sat straight up and poised, because that just happened.

"Now you know how I feel. Dude's got soft hands." Vivian laughed when Shona just nodded in pure agreement, and suddenly the lights started to change their hue. The runway show was about to start, and instantly Vivian thought about Lexi. He was sending her high vibes, but he knew she will slay as she always does. The man who held the seat next to Ambrose returned, as he was walking back they given short greetings to those who did greet him. Vivian watched as this man sat down with a small, glass-like tablet, and Ambrose leaned towards him to hear what he had to say. This guy had a healthily olive skin tone, shoulder length hair being brunette from his roots and then gradually became a highlighted brown color near his curled ends. His eyes were very blue, and he had black shaped brows, and a naturally contoured jawline.

He was friggin' _good looking._

His outfit was more-than just as spiffy as everyone's around him, but it looked uber-expensive; slim-tapered steel blue slacks and the underneath dress shirt was black. His fitted blazer matched the color of his slacks, but from the shoulders down there were white laced-patterns that progressively got smaller as the lace design went down his suit, disappearing when it reached his mid-abdomen. Vivian's eyes went wide; this man was wearing one of the exclusive collections from Ambrose's issue, that thing costs a _fortune_! And from what the fashion designer can see, this particular man happened to be very associated with the trillionaire as well.

Already, there were pairs of models walking along with the music, one would come from the left opening and the other from the right. They strutted as usual, the fashion designer could see that they were actually _trying_ not to look at the person right in front of the walkway. Vivian could easily tell that the clothing shown right now was not Ambrose's because they were flashy, and that wasn't his brand's style per se.

"Why is everybody glancing back at him?"

Vivian shifted over to Shona, who was whispering even though the music would make hard for anyone within a three foot radius to hear their voices at normal volume. But the fashion designer could make out what he said. "Uhh- okay, look. It's a _thing_ that a lot of us do. Like, this is what, the fifth time people have seen him within the audience of these runways and so far, every time he comes here many of the designers look to him to see what he thinks." There was no ill will to what he said; Ambrose was a _big_ deal. "It's not like we have to, either. We accidentally do it."

Shona chuckled. "Wow, great way to put pressure on someone."

"He's not even pressured, he's just calming sitting there." The fashion designer looked to the trillionaire, and looked at his left-hand tuxedo-clad guy. He was starting to catch Vivian's eye, but the designer digressed; he wasn't single himself.

"Is that why they look at him? They want to see his approval?" Shona looked at Vivian.

" _Yes."_ Vivian nodded dramatically. "It's very hard to _notice_ how he thinks and reacts. Like, even a smile from him is rare, and I think Cal told me it happened _once_ , and that was only a _smirk_."

Shona looked at the trillionaire, at the models, and then at everyone else in the audience who was flickering gazes in his direction. The sight, to the actor, was quite comical. "He looks so neutral and everyone else is just so uppity, it's hilarious."

Shona's accent sounds so cute when he uses certain words. "I would laugh but… I'm guilty of it too. Sometimes." _Most of the time_. Vivian smiled as he and the actor shared the thought, until Vivian noticed that Lexi had stepped out and into the runway-

"Holy shit, holy shit!" Vivian said to, basically himself, and that was when Shona also noticed the fellow model emerging.

The actor leaned back, and placed a hand over his chest. "...wow… She's-wow…"

Lexi's outfit was an amazing looking bodysuit, with complimenting shiny black heels, a bezeled necklace. Her _walk_ was catlike, but very feminine and confident much like how she is all the time. Her makeup was also impeccable, it was touched up so she looked different from when Vivian previously spoke with her. Her look was enough to make pretty much everyone in the audience follow her as she strutted to the front of the runway to the beat.

Vivian's eyes followed Lexi as he fought the urge to yell 'YESSSSS' because that would be a little too over-the-top, and then his gaze stopped when he noticed something peculiar. The hark-to-break trillionaire was leaned in speaking with his bodyguards about something while looking at the models walking in and out, but when Lexi came forward, he appeared to _stop talking_ , slowly sat straight up.

"Shona, look, look!" He eagerly tapped the actor next to him, who looked at the trillionaire's reaction.

"No way…" Shona's smile gradually got larger as Ambrose kept his full attention on the model who was now approaching him. He didn't move any further, he didn't smile nor did he frown, he just watched Lexi as she stopped, posed easily, and then turned right back around.

It was as if the two had a eureka moment, because they both turned to each other and quietly exclaimed 'yes' and got all animated over it as well. Until Shona frowned. "Wait, why am _I_ excited about this?"

Vivian snickered. "It rubs off on you, dude."

 _Everybody and their uncle_ in the audience noticed that too _._ When Lexi was out once more, Ambrose's eyebrows _slightly_ went up by like… three millimeters, maybe. It was settled like concrete; that was approval. All the fashion designers that sat amongst each other, the ones behind Vivian and Shona, started discussing amongst each other. More models came along with her a few more times, and then Lexi came up wearing a dress from Ambrose's collection. It was a forest green chiffon dress that, once again, divinely suited her curves. The more conservative v-neck (it went down to the beginning of her breasts) had phthalo green rhinestones decorating its outline, and the sleeves well bell curved. Her shoes were velvet, and the same color as the rhinestones themselves, and her eyeliner was black with a slight dark red eyeshadow.

To put a long description short, Lexi looked like a goddess.

She caught the eyes of everyone, including the same person who hadn't cracked a smile at all during this whole fashion show. And so far, she's gone up a few times and this might her last garment to wear. There were so many models anyway, so the lines would run by rather smoothly. The show has been going on for about thirty something minutes, and it was about to reach its end. Compared to the usual ten minute shows that most runways take, this one had a multitude of lines from the best of the best, so it's reasonable and _worth the time_ that this show has taken.

"You know what," Shona clasped his hands together. "I might start coming to these things more often."

Vivian was busy looking at the man next to Ambrose, and Ambrose himself. He was still looking at the models while asking his left-hand man something. But he didn't completely miss what Shona said. "If you have the time of course..." Vivian smiled.

He honestly couldn't _wait_ to tell Lexi about what he and the others had witnessed.

°ºooº°°ºooº°°ºooº°°ºooº°°ºooº°°ºooº°

"What?!"

A bark.

"Excuse me?!"

Another bark.

"You better stop talking back!" That statement from the God earned a low growl, and then a louder bark from the malamute who happened to be lounging next to him. His bottom and rear paws were on Zamasu's lap and the Kaioshin was reclined in his seat. Rebecca just finished taking a shower, and this was the first thing she was introduced to as she went down the stairs.

"What did you just say to me?" Loki growled. "Cut it out."

The malamute yapped.

"Cut it out!"

Loki wasn't having it at all. He made a noise, and Zamasu sat up. "What?" Loki looked down at his own paws, and then he moved his head so that his snout would boop Zamasu's forehead. "You-stop it."

There was a pause between the two, and Rebecca raised a brow. She actually had never seen Loki so talkative before, not to mention being somewhat rowdy with a God. He sat there with an annoyed look on his face, and that nearly made the Kaioshin dial back on this heated argument.

"You like having the last word, don't you?"

Loki's bark was now high pitched all of the sudden, and he started reaching forward with his paws.

"Why?"

The malamute barked again.

"Just lay ther-" Loki interrupted him when his paw went near Zamasu's mouth. "Why are you doing this?!"

Loki yipped, and his paw found its way to Zamasu's face again. The Kaioshin had to move his head away. "What do you mean?!" Loki grumbled, and Rebecca quietly stood near the stairs trying to hold in her silent laughter. Even Zamasu was cracking a chuckle at the whole situation.

"You're still a baby. You don't talk back to your elders, Loki." Zamasu held a finger up at the malamute. Loki didn't have anything to rebuttal with that, because it was true, so since he technically lost the argument, the malamute lifted his own hind paw and started putting it in his mouth. Zamasu nodded, knowing he was the victor. "Yes, _foot in mouth_ , exactly!"

Rebecca silently laughed at the sight, while Zamasu was chuckling at Loki's form of _'Fine, you got me_ '. He facepalmed, while Loki shifted a little in his seat. The doctor approached the Kaioshin sitting. "How long have you two been arguing?"

"I have no idea." Zamasu answered honestly. Loki moved away from him, and went off to do his malamute things. The Kaioshin looked at him momentarily, and then he sighed. "He'll be fine. Loki would get over it quickly."

"I'm sure he would." Rebecca plopped down next to him, and right she did she winced and leaned forward.

Zamasu looked at her. "What happened?"

Rebecca pursed her lips together, and then she looked at him and smiled. "Period."

"What?" _Oh._ "I see."

She was fine moments later, she looked down at her lap. "I've been fine all day even though it happened yesterday morning, but I'm also hungry too." She got up again and looked at Zamasu. "Do you wanna eat as well?"

He didn't need to. "I'm fine." Rebecca nodded, and skipped her way into the kitchen. Zamasu blinked and furrowed his brows, she seems so… uppity today. Even when she came home, she had more of a spring in her step. Did something good happen and he didn't know about it? He really didn't know. She started humming to herself while preparing her lunch, and the Kaioshin was too curious to just sit there and read his book.

"Rebecca." He called her name out, and her head popped out of the kitchen with a smile. "Why are you in such a good mood today?"

She shrugged, but was still smiling. "I dunno!" And then she went back to humming and making her lunch.

Zamasu stood up and went into the kitchen to see what she was doing, and partly because he inadvertently wanted some tea. He did the whole routine of filling the kettle up with water and placing it on the stove, and summoning a teacup because he honestly likes using the ones back in the Kaishin realm. He felt a hand tap his upper back softly, and he turned to the elated doctor behind him.

"You wanna watch a movie with me?"

Later, he decided that perhaps, he could spend some time watching a movie at least. The Kaioshin didn't mind having to be next to her either, even less so than he normally would. When he had finished sipping his tea in the living room, and Rebecca finished eating, she went to where the control panel on her sofa was and she selected a movie of her choice. She had already asked Zamasu if he wanted any particular genre and he said he didn't mind, so she tapped a single movie and then plopped down next to the Kaioshin.

"I saw this movie several times already, but I love it so much." She sat up, poised with positivity while the Kaioshin leaned away. "What's wrong?"

Rebecca happened to be a little _too_ close to Zamasu at the moment. If Rebecca was a few inches closer to him, she would practically be on his lap. "Can you move a little?"

"Oh, right." She giggled, and placed a hand on his arm apologetically. "Sorry about that." She kept her hand on his arm, feeling the fabric of his gi. "Your gi is really soft."

Zamasu looked down at her feelsy hand, and then back at her. "Umm… Thank you?" That earned him a smile from her, and Rebecca clasped her hand against her thigh.

"You don't mind if I lean on you?" Rebecca said this while her hands snaked their way against his arm again, and he frowned.

"Haven't I told you before to stop being so touchy?"

"But… you're all soft and stuff." She was referring to his clothes in general.

"Grab a pillow instead."

"Pillows are boring." She pouted.

"Pouting isn't going to work on me." Zamasu shook his head and crossed his arms, looking away from Rebecca. He stayed like that for a moment, until he continued to feel her eyes on him. He opened one grey eye to look back at her, he didn't realize how big her eyes were.

The Kaioshin took the heaviest sigh that he could possibly muster. " _Fine._ " He loosened his arms and she piqued at his approval, pulling the Kaioshin close and snuggling onto his sleeve. "Don't try anything funny with me, woman."

"Funny?" She looked at him. "You mean like this?" Rebecca sat up a little, and then she started poking his side. She looked down at his abdomen while doing this and when she looked back up, she was met with a face of pure confusion.

"What are you trying to do?" Zamasu blinked.

Rebecca flushed. "...I thought you were ticklish."

"Why would I be ticklish?"

"I dunno, I mean I don't think Gods are immune to that stuff." Then, a smirk slowly grew on her face. "Maybe you're ticklish on your ears."

The damn woman started going for his ears and doing that whole ticklish motion there, which instantly made Zamasu flinch (not out of pain) from the contact and slap her hands away in recoil. "My ears are not _ticklish_ , you idiot! I told you never to lay your hands on them!"

She forgot about his sensitive ears. The last time she did that, it made him slightly jump. "Oh, oh, I'm sorry. I uhh… forgot."

Zamasu gave her a look. "Do I have to escort you to the same place that your work at? You keep forgetting things."

She sighed. "Zamasu, it's not _that_ serious dude!"

"Yes it is." He said matter-of-factly. "You're only _twenty five_ , you shouldn't be having such horrible memory at such a young age."

"Age isn't the only thing that affects memory."

"Then what does?" His eyebrows were raised in a curt way.

"I dunno, like injuries and stuff." As a doctor, she could have been more specific but she's not at her job. Who the heck knows anything about regional muscle damage in the hippocampus, or the effect of induced trauma to the limbic system? Certainly not the author, at least not to your knowledge.

"What, were you injured before?" He leaned forward. The movie was still playing, but this conversation is important.

Rebecca frowned at him, and it was not because he was wrong in that aspect. "Obviously not."

"That's concerning."

"Whaddya know about injuries, _sir_?" She crossed her arms at him. "I'm the prestigious doctor here."

"It doesn't take such a respected title to know that forgetting a lot of information is concerning."

Rebecca had noticed over the course of a few days how Zamasu was changing the social landscape of her household. She used to call the shots around here, her dogs had her as the primary owner, the master. But it's only been a little over a week, and Zamasu is suddenly showing himself to be this dominant, paternal figure in her, and her dogs' lives. It was sweet to see and… kind of attractive. She sat back with crossed arms and a crooked smile, because he was right and she couldn't argue with him.

"I stand corrected." Zamasu took her silence as it should be, and smirked. He didn't realize how much these conversations with Rebecca amused him. Just to spite him, she held on to his arm and pulled herself against him with a frowny pout. He looked down at her. "The fact that you're frowning at me makes it even better."

"Shush." Rebecca held a finger up in front of him while looking at the TV screen, focusing her attention to the movie. It went on for quite a while, until a particular scene came up and Zamasu heard sniffing noises from the woman on his arm. He slowly looked down as Rebecca leaned forward to grab the entire tissue box off of her coffee table, and speaking of which, why the heck has it been there in the first place?

"That _so sad_." She patted her tiny tears away with a tissue.

Zamasu furrowed his brows. "You told me you've watched this movie _several times._ "

"I did, but-" Rebecca sniffed. "It's sad…"

She continued to wipe her eyes, and Zamasu refocused his attention on the movie, albeit _warily._ When she arrived home today, she wasn't as happy as she was before, she was just neutral. And then outta nowhere, she comes skipping down the stairs, into the kitchen cooking, cuddles next to the Kaioshin while she's watching a movie, and now she's crying over some scene she's watched more than once. Her mood swings were weird, is this what human women do? Because he's been with four other guys and they never had this kind of behavior.

Rebecca did say that she was going through _that time of the month_ , a term he heard from a show, and as far as he knew females tend to be… unpredictable during menstruation. Irene is kind of an exception, _kind of_ , she's still a brat even when her body is cramping. He probably is sitting right next to someone who is the exact opposite of that, maybe she is more affected by a menstrual cycle. The Kaioshin can't imagine it being horridly bad for Rebecca. He was certain that the doctor leaning against his arm…

Who was now laughing…

...Wasn't going to become erratic or barmy over the next five to six days. She's a grown woman, Zamasu knows this already; she can handle herself very well, and he definitely wouldn't need to worry about a thing.

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 **Lexi is confirmed Naomi Campbell in this chapter, lol.**

 **Zamasu just met another character, and this time, it's not a human. It is a superintelligent AI who's quite sentient, and Zamasu has never seen such a 'mortal' life form before.**

 **I think it kind of mirrors the way Universe 10 is in the actual anime, because its twin universe is Universe 3, and we all know their God of Destruction is a legit robot. It's also a very techy universe, so… I actually didn't think of this before introducing this individual too, it came to me after I finished typing this chapter out lol.**

 **Heck, this could have came out yesterday but I was doing other things xD. Tell me what you guys think of this chapter, see ya's next week!**


	25. Going with the Flow

**I know, I know, this chapter came out much faster than it should have. I have to say that I** _ **enjoy the fuck**_ **out of writing Zamasu exploring things, that was basically the entire premise of the past five chapters, so I could understand it might be boring for some people. Zamasu has to explore, and it might not make sense because Rebecca herself is just as isolated as he tends to be. The Kaioshin can't simply sit in her house all day, that's probably something that's expected, but he came here to know more about the species he hates. Him meeting all these people counts as that, because without it the story would get more convoluted and more fucked up than it already is, or will be.**

 **So I pushed this update a bit sooner, since this chapter was written** _ **way**_ **before the last chapter was published, because I felt like it. However, the next update won't be pushed back, it will still be next Sunday so I kinda sacrificed the waiting time to get this one through :).**

 **That explanation was** _ **long winded**_ **, so here's chapter 25!**

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 **Going With The Flow**

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Zamasu sat down on his bed, it was now around 11 something at night, and about an hour ago he had finished showing Rebecca certain techniques pertaining to self-defense. Of all the promises he broke from the malamute, he didn't manage to forget about training Rebecca, but he was kind of inquisitive about her suddenly popping the question for him to start showing her defense tactics _immediately after_ her movie had finished. Especially considering her current state, but as time went on and as he demonstrated forms of martial arts in front of her, he found that she wasn't being physically stymied at all.

Rebecca did quite well, he showed her only a few tactics as she was never introduced to martial arts before, so he couldn't actually pick up the pace with her and he _wouldn't have_ because she kind of needed to take a bit of a backseat before actually learning combatant skills. Zamasu was very much to himself, he was solitary man, but being a Kaioshin was something he's _learned_ to aspire to.

In truth, the occupation of a Kaioshin was not the reason as to why he was training to become one. When he was honing his martial art skills, studying and learning every technique his younger, green little hands could find, not once did he think of doing so just because he wanted to be a Kaioshin. He learned to fight because he simply wanted to _learn_ ; he wanted to balance the weight of strength and intelligence, and for tens of thousands of years he has learned to tune his strength with the purity of his heart. Therefore, it is fair to say the opposite; he is on his way to becoming a Kaioshin _because_ of his notable strength.

Gowasu saw to his expertise earlier than even Zamasu did, in his younger years he was so into learning his craft that he didn't pay attention to how good he actually was. He just kept soaking up knowledge, kept wanting to learn, kept being _curious_. His mentor tells Zamasu so many times that he is one of the most curious Kais he ever came across.

When he was younger and during the beginning of being Gowasu's student, he'd always imagine taking the place of a Supreme Kai and passing on his knowledge the same way Gowasu has been doing. He aspired to becoming a mentor himself, to take someone in and raise them to their highest version, so while he was learning new information, he was also learning how to put forth the same information for someone who wishes to learn from him. But who would've thought that the first student he would have ended up being of the same species he hated the most?

 _Ironic_.

He didn't even think about that until now. It didn't make him puke out of his mouth over the idea of a human having to be under his teachings, but perhaps it was because he knew Rebecca has the potential to learn. But it will take time for him figure out what exactly were her _real_ motives for wanting to learn how to fight.

 **¨·..·¨·..·¨·..·¨**

The next day, late in the afternoon, Rebecca returned home from work. She was supposed to work a bit later than her usual time so she got more sleep to rest her entire body. She greeted Zamasu, well rather she ran up to him and gave him a really tight hug of which made the Kaioshin wince at her grip, and then went upstairs to take a shower.

Right now, Zamasu was reading a book that he was halfway into, sitting on a chair in the dining room. He barely ever sits there, it's the one area in the house that he doesn't particularly stay in for long, but today was an exception. The Kaioshin was facing away from the kitchen so he could only hear but not see anything occurring there.

One particular thing he repeatedly heard was the sound of her walking into the kitchen, getting something, and leaving. At first, she had these bags that she brought home after work and he heard the rustling of them as she came to-and-fro, and then the fridge was opened in her recursive trips as well. He frowned when it stopped completely, but didn't turn around to impede on what she was doing. Zamasu continued reading until he completely finished the book, closing it soundly and placing it on the dining table, and stood up to exit the room and enter the kitchen.

Even during his reading, he'd hear the sound of someone eating crunchy food in the living room. Of course it was from the only woman in the house with him, that was obvious, but Rebecca came downstairs half an hour ago, going to-and-fro the kitchen and living room for a few times, and she was still eating. He frowned as he was beginning to make another cup of tea, which would probably take a good five something minutes since he was using the smaller kettle, and he imagined she'd be done by then.

There was this one particular sound of something hissing before being opened, and this was even _after_ he had finished making tea. His brows furrowed, she was _still_ eating? How does a mortal female even eat that much? Rebecca isn't even that big, she's a petite woman and he thought she wouldn't be able to finish a whole fruit bowl without complaining about a bellyache.

Zamasu walked out of the living room, only to be greeted by a… _hefty_ sight of chips, ice cream, soda, dips, cupcakes all scattered around her coffee table. Most of the food mentioned was _finished_ , even the twelve-piece container of cupcakes was completely empty. There were two large bags of chips that were empty, a whole soda bottle was now a quarterway full, and she was holding a giant spoonful of ice cream in her hand while focusing on the television before her. She took a _mean_ size off of the spoon, and giggled at the TV because she was watching something funny. The Kaioshin slowly made his way to where she was, and sat down next to her. Rebecca only glazed an eye at him before looking back at the TV, and he stared at the copious amounts of food that she ate all by herself. He reached out for a chip bag, and his hand was instantly slapped away.

He looked over at her, she wasn't even _looking_ when she did that. He tried again, and she inadvertently slapped his hand away again. Zamasu frowned at her, and looked down at the ice cream box. It was chocolate, from what he could tell, mixed with other things. He wanted to lift the box to see what flavor it was, but that immediately earned him a cold, territorial, death glare that he could _feel._ Rebecca stared at him momentarily, and he looked at her as he retracted his hand. The doctor looked him up and down, and then continued eating.

She wasn't being rude or anything to _him_ directly, it's just that she'd go ape-shit if he touched any of her food, and Zamasu's sensitive ears didn't want to deal with any yelling.

The green God stood up and backed away from the doctor, who pretty much moved from his intrusion immediately. He blinked two times, is this what menstrual cycles could do to a woman? They _eat_ like _this_? It kind of made sense in a way, but… could Rebecca even finish all of that?

"...Rebecca..."

She now had that giant soda bottle pressing to her mouth as she took giant, unladylike gulps of it. Rebecca didn't even remove the bottle for her mouth, she just side-looked at him. "MMM?"

"Are you…" He pointed to her food and she lowered the bottle from her mouth as she looked at him. "Going to… finish all of that?"

"Yeah?" Rebecca frowned at him. "What? What's wrong?"

There was a lot of junk food on the table. He was kinda getting concerned for her physical well-being, and it had nothing to do with innocuous things. It was more for the training aspect; eating foods that aren't extensively healthy is not a good thing, especially when you are learning martial arts. You treat your body like a temple, because you might need to use it for defense.

Unless if you're some enriched person who doesn't need to thrive off of food and can still live happily, that's perfectly fine.

"It's a lot of food." He looked down at the table. "All of this stuff seems fattening."

He used the _wrongest_ term possible for someone who is losing iron as he spoke. Rebecca blinked a few times at him with a look, she didn't say anything for a while. Zamasu cocked his neck back, and she leaned forward. " _What?_ "

"I said that stuff that you're eating might… jeopardize your health." He wasn't sure why she was looking at him like that. And the more she did, the more intense her glare got, he had never seen her this angry.

"You think that I'll get _fat_ from all this?" She was practically on her knees against the sofa with both her hands on the headrest. "Huh?!"

She was raising her voice, and her temper didn't make Zamasu try to threaten her at all. There's something scary about a woman on her menstrual cycle, we all know this already. "Rebecca, I was just _saying_ you shouldn't be eating so much of this junk food. Calm down."

Another mistake on his part; telling someone to calm down when they're angry won't help any situation. "It's not like I'll explode or anything."

"I know you won't."

"Then let me be." She swiftly turned around, suddenly closing the argument. Zamasu blinked at her.

"Excuse m-" She shot him another primal glare and he stopped, not because he was scared, but because _geez, she was furious._ It wasn't like she was doing this solely on purpose either, he understood that. And that's why he refrains from actually hitting her, it's not her fault.

 _Soooo_ he took a few steps backwards, and went upstairs to leave the woman alone; the last thing he _ought_ to do is perpetuate her anger further. He went to Loki's room, just to see if the malamute was up or not. Loki was sleeping at the moment, curled up into a comfortable furry ball with both his ears drooped downwards. Zamasu went to his own quarters, knowing Ollie wasn't in his room, and sat down in one of the lounge chairs by the infinity table. He looked down at the table, and absentmindedly slipped out his seat to play with the colors once more. He slid open the compartment where the panel was, and looked at the color array.

There were two particular colors that caught his eye, for some reason he found that he had this strange liking for the rosy pink hue, which budded when he first tested out the table's panel. Looking at the table, the lights slowly phased into the rose color, descending pseudo-infinitely until they disappeared in the table. He selected green again, but not that lighter hue that he had before. He went for a more vibrant, emerald green to go with the rose, seeing the two create a complimentative pair. Without a thought, he went for another color that was subconsciously prompted to the Kaioshin, in lieu of the two other colors he chose.

This particular color, was molten gold.

 **:¨·..·¨::¨·..·¨:**

The fashion show night was eventful, the show was excellent overall. Lexi got a chance to meet _many_ of the top-tier designers, and also the other supermodels. Some celebrities had recognized her clothing or perfume lines surprisingly; both said lines weren't as popular as theirs, and she was grateful to have their recognition.

The first thing that Vivian did when he saw her during the aftermath was run up to her and hug her dearly over the whole show. Shona did compliment her overlook performance, saying that she deserved to be here of course. It seemed like the two couldn't hold in some revelling news, and when they did tell her…

" _Ambrose notably likes your presentation."_

 _Lexi kind of paused while the smile on her face slowly faded, because the sentence itself hasn't registered in her yet. She looked at the fashion designer. "What?"_

 _How many time has she said that this night? Vivian slowed his statement down. "Ambrose… he looked interested in yo-"_

" _Wha-wh- Don't say it again!" She figured it out already. "He DID?!"_

" _Yeah!" Vivian smiled. "Like- once the show ended, so many designers came up to him and started asking him stuff. He doesn't even own this runway!" He laughed, and Lexi didn't constrain the flattered smile on her face._

That information _still_ had her shook. And right now, laying in her hotel bedroom with a robe, the model was rapidly calling her friends one by one to tell them how great the show was. Her boyfriend congratulated her on behalf of the show itself and Irene was also ecstatic to hear that it went well, but Lexi kept what Vivian told her as clandestine information between her, him, and Shona. She decided not to tell her friends that as it was just _simple_ admiration on her behalf, to get all hype about it with her friends would be ridiculous.

Even though, the idea of being noticed by someone you've been _very avid_ of is still jarring. In a good way, but it's not something you can tell to your friends without jumping up and down and making your heart double its circadian rhythm.

She got to the last person in her contacts, their name was above a number that Adrian had sent her a text of. She was told that this would be Zamasu's new phone because the guys were planning something formal and important and they wanted easier contact of him. He said by the end of the week, he'll drive over to Rebecca's house and give it to Zamasu himself so that the Kaioshin could be easily applicable.

Hopefully he doesn't lose it or something.

She tapped Rebecca's contact ID, putting the phone on speaker because she wanted to change into some clothes. She placed the phone on her bed, got up and stripped the robe off of her body, going to her hotelroom's closet to find something to wear for the day. If she was going to be in Lyn, she might as well actually get to _see_ this fabulous place before she would receive calls from her modeling agency and be put back to some form of work. The phone rang about four times, before it finally and the female voice of her friend would pop up as expected-  
"Hello?"

That was not a female voice.

Lexi looked back at her phone. She was across the room and she didn't think the person would pick up, the woman hadn't even picked out any clothes yet. With a hurried jog, she looked down at the dark green mobile device on her bed. "Oh, Zamasu! Hey there!"

A moment's worth of a pause, before he spoke again. "Oh, it's you."

He didn't say that in a negative way, he genuinely sounded surprised. She wondered why, but remembered Rebecca had a thing for giving the people in her contacts nicknames. "How've you been? And how do you have Rebecca's phone, she's at work at this time right?" It was the early afternoon where she was at, she imagined it'd be earlier than that back in Tycho.

"She is, but the woman forgot her phone." She didn't forget it, Rebecca left it because she felt no need to take it with her over the past couple of days. Zamasu didn't know that, and it didn't make sense to him either. "I'm fine."

"Oh… that's strange." Lexi frowned. She was now at the closet again, speaking a bit louder for him to hear her.

"Woman." His suddenly very stern voice made her pause, and she turned around. "I know you're doing something over there, but I can _hear you_. You don't need to raise your voice."

 _Right_ , he has divine godly ears. It made sense, they were pretty huge so she imagine he could damn hear somebody's thoughts with them. "Oh… I'm sorry. And i have a name. Use it." She spoke in a normal clear voice, and that earned a sound of approval from the Kaioshin on the other end.

"I'll try. What is strange?" He had to admit, he shared the same sentiment as her, but Lexi probably had a different reason. For Zamasu, it was Rebecca _abruptly_ leaving her phone alone.

"She's almost _always_ using it, like everyday." Lexi looked at a particular deep red shirt for a while, concurrently deciding on wearing it or not. "Even when I invite her to my place, she treats it like a limb." The model chuckled.

"I seen it myself. I live with her at the moment, you know." She heard a faint sound of barking. "She's been acting… weird."

"Weird?" Lexi returned to the bed with her chosen attire plopped onto the soft mattress. She went into her drawer to get a bra and undergarments, sliding right into a lace underwear while looking at her phone. "How?"

"Well… okay, I know that you human women have something that you do a dozen times in a year or so. She's in _that time of the month,_ and I didn't expect much from it _._ " Lexi stopped, her bra in both hands. A pause, before the model laughed, which made Zamasu furrow his brows. "What's funny?"

"You sound really concerned." She smiled, shaking her hand at the dorky green guy on the phone. "It's not weird at all, it's normal. I go through the same thing as well."

"But she's becoming more _erratic_." The Kaioshin was feeling against a deep red pillow on the sofa. "Just yesterday, she was eating an _inhumanly large_ amount of food, and she was angry when I told her not to eat so much. And then this woman comes into my room and nearly tries to _hug_ me before her curfew, she kept getting up over and over at night, and she didn't eat anything before she left the house."

"Zamasu, Zamasu…" Lexi had to admit, he sounded very concerned but she could tell he was just a confused sweetheart. "She's _fine_. It's only for a week, and then she'll go back to being her old self when her reproductive system isn't ripping itself a new one." As expected, an audible cringe came from the Kaioshin. "It's just a cycle, how bad could it be?"

There was a silence on the other end. Zamasu was looking all around the living room because Lexi's reassurance sounded so promising. "She tried to bite my hand off when I was reaching for a bag of tea."

" _Dude listen,_ periods make us go haywire okay? Just… don't upset her."

" _How?!_ " He was actually confused. "Do all human women act like this?"

"No no, our reactions are different. It varies, ya know. I don't have much a bad temper, but I'd like to hold soft things a lot more." Lexi sat on her bed, finally putting her bra on.

 _See that's actually more tolerable, having a thing for soft materials._ Zamasu shook his head only to entertain that single thought. "How do I navigate through this then?"

The model was putting on her red shirt, so he heard a shuffling sound on his end. She nearly started chuckling at how Zamasu was treating this with so much concern. Him not knowing what to do was very, very amusing. "We really like chocolate and stuff that makes us cramp less. That's all I can tell ya." Lexi shifted in her seat to face her phone as if he was in the room with her. "Just… try not ask too many questions, if she does get that upset. Chocolate is the go-to thing for her."

"But… I like chocolate…" That was rare moment for Zamasu, it was sort of uncharacteristic for him to _say that out loud_ like that, but barriers are being broken down as we speak.

"Do you want her to bite your hand off when you're eating some?" That earned a sound with which Lexi obviously guess that he was shaking his head vigorously. "Then sacrifices have to be made, my friend."

He sighed. "Okay..." Yes, having to share, to rather _donate_ , chocolate to a human is one the most heart wrenching things one could do. It doesn't matter if you're a God or not. "What are you doing over there? I keep hearing noises."

"I'm changing right now." The once completely naked model was putting on white curvy-fit jeans. She was so lucky she couldn't see the look on his face because all Zamasu said was-

"Oh." And then he quickly asked something else. "Why did you call?"

A sweet smile formed over Lexi's face. "Well… two days ago, I had a fashion show and I wanted to call Rebecca to tell her about it, but she isn't here right now. I dunno if you have any interest in that stuff, but it was great."

"You can… tell me more." The Kaioshin felt obliged to hear more of this event for some strange reason. Besides, he had nothing else to do other than sit in the living room and watch some random show by himself.

Lexi furrowed her brows, but she digressed. "See, this was basically one of those high-class _exclusive_ fashion shows. A bunch of celebrities from all around the world come to see the collections from different designers. And every model there was pretty much a global name, and they're all very beautiful faces."

"Why do you sound so excited over that?"

She paused. "I've never actually… been on a fashion show of that caliber."

"Really?" He actually sat up in his seat. "This is your first time?"

"Yeah…"

"Don't all the pretty women, like you said, go there?"

"Mm-hmm." She nodded. "But they're prestigious models, like… triple-A names." The model looked down, tracing some random shape on her bed with a growing smirk. "Why are you shocked?"

She wasn't expecting him to stammer before speaking. "Well… it's because, umm…" _Mere words shouldn't hurt to say, Zamasu_ , he thought to himself. "You're a pretty woman, so I figured that you'd… be in those things more often."

The smile on her face grew even more at his abashedness. " _Awww_ …" A giggle. "Thanks, that's so sweet of you."

"You're welcome." His voice was quiet on the other end.

Standing up and going to her drawer this time, Lexi continued to speak seeing that Zamasu wasn't fond of giving compliments. "So like, this event was amazing overall, and I met a lot of high-end, top-tier fashion designers and models who did admire my presentation- oh, I almost forgot, I had photographs of my outfits, I should send them to Rebecca after this."

"Wait, what?" Zamasu asked. "You said this event was _exclusive_. Shouldn't photographs be kept a secret?"

"Not if they're appearing on later books." Lexi piqued up, already going through her gallery to pick the _right_ pictures out. She didn't want to spoil too much for her friend, so she'll send only two photos. "But yeah, my first time actually meeting some of these big-leagues was here. I am… I am grateful."

Zamasu felt a vibration on his ear, receiving the photos from Lexi. But he moved the phone away from his pointed ear after it vibrated because his ears are _very sensitive_. It stopped a moment later, and he placed it back onto his ear. "I am… glad to hear that." That sounded strange, coming out of his mouth. But then again, he was speaking to Lexi, she sounded reasonable and pleasant. "I'm sure that more good things will come your way."

Lexi's smile got bigger. "Thank you so much. You're such a sweetheart, Zamasu."

"I am what?" He answered immediately. "Don't call me that."

"Why not?"

"Because…" He didn't know why, so he came up with the best reason that a divine God would. "Because I said so."

"But it's true…" Lexi smirked, she was teasing him, and he was stammering once again.  
"I'd-you-... shut up."

The model laughed. "I wouldn't." She took her phone into her hands. "But unfortunately, I kinda gotta go now. If you can, would you relay what I said to Rebecca? I know she'll see the pictures in her notifications."

She probably might not, because Zamasu is curious as hell, he might open those pictures before Rebecca would. _Might_. "Alright then. Goodbye."

"Bye-bye." Lexi pressed the hang up button, smiling down at her phone while shaking her head. The first time she recalled meeting him he was so stoic, and now she finds that he's actually a really cool guy, and that was merely a near two-weeks ago. Such a time at the airport felt like it happened an entire month ago.

She sighed, stood up from her bed and went to get a pair of shoes. She decided on flats, because she didn't feel like wearing heels today at all. The flats themselves were a black lace design, the patterns themselves were big around the ends of her toes, and progressively got smaller as they traveled to where her soles were. Lexi paused for a moment before turning towards the door to leave-

Out of nowhere, the hotel's phone rang on the coffee table in the 'living room' area of her hotel room. Lexi quickly turned to the sudden sound; hotels always have landline phones in each and every room that are used vicariously for different things inside and around the building. Usually, they don't _call_ unless if there was a certain problem that arose in where she was temporarily staying. Lexi went to it and bent over to pick up the phone. "...Hello?"

"Hello, good afternoon. Is this Lexi Rayne?"

This particular voice was from a guy with a very formal, British accent. The way they spoke showed to her that this person was in a business of some sort. She frowned at the way this person went straight for what they needed to say. "Yes…?"

"Alright. I'm Avery Va Dinci, first assistant of Rose Corporation. Ambrose found your presentation of the many designer-wears very outstanding, and finds that you'd be a great fit to work alongside his newest collection."

Lexi just stood there, silently, the phone slowly loosening in her hands. There was no pause or nothing, this person straight up just said that without any kind of suspenseful factor. Did she hear that correctly?

"Hello?"

She nearly dropped the phone but quickly caught it with her above average reflexes. "Uh yes, yes, I'm here, I'm still here." _Calm down, Lex. Please._ "I'm sorry, you said that he would like to _work_ with me?"

"Yes."

Is this happening right now? Do you know what this _means_ for her career? And this first assistant casually told her this as if it was some 'come to my ice cream parlor' type of thing. It makes sense, since Avery apparently is his first assistant.

The man continued. "He would like to get your affirmation first."

"Of course, of course I'd work with him!" Lexi immediately said. She looked down at her shoes, _this is actually happening_.

"That's great. There's only one available date for a one-on-one meeting with him, he'll be very busy over this week."

"O-one available date?" She ought to apologize for her sudden stuttering, because this information was _big news_.

"Yes. You have a phone number, correct?"

"I do, I do. Here…" she waited for Avery to give her his cue, and then she gave him her number over the phone.

"Alright, I will call you later to discuss this further, and send you a concrete text of your appointment time and date." She nodded. "Have a good day."

Lexi returned the farewell to him, and hung the phone up. She then sat down with her hand against her temple while her elbow rested against her knee. Just when she thought things _couldn't_ get any better, and now she was on her way to working for a big-league man, and a _trillion-fucking-naire_. It's funny how all of this happened, all of this good fortune took place, right after she spoke with Zamasu.

Who, of course, happened to be a God.

She might just hug him the next time she sees him, even if the two incidents had nothing to do with one another. Now, there was another piece of big news that she definitely had to tell her significant others. Lexi continued to stare at the ground, utterly shocked that this even went down.

 _Holy shit._

/¯\/¯\/¯\/¯\/¯\/¯\

The said Kaioshin was in the kitchen, making himself some tea. It was now in the evening, that conversation with Lexi happened about a couple of hours ago. Rebecca also returned home from work, and the first thing she did was greet him _cordially_ , and then when straight for the fridge. She then left the kitchen and went to the door that led to her garage. He figured she'd buy herself food while she was out, but apparently she did no-

The doctor came back into the living room, she kicked the garage door back open and waltzed in with two large brown, rather fancy looking bags. She could barely even walk correctly because of how heavy the bags seemed.

"Guess what I gooooooot!" Rebecca sing-songed as she sauntered to the kitchen, and plopped the bags onto her dining room table. She then turned back to Zamasu with a smile. "Guess what I bought today…"

This was very different behavior compared to this morning. She literally woke up and left her house as if he didn't exist. "What did you bring?"

"Guess!" She jumped up with her hands dramatic out, and he blinked.

"...Food?"

"Not just _any_ kinda food, sonny." She went back to the bags. If she weren't cramping and having mood swings every moment, he would've castigated her for calling him such a name. "I bought _fancy_ dinner for myself, I've been super hungry all day and even eating at a breakfast bar this morning didn't help, so-"

She groaned a little, fitting both arms into the bag picking up whatever she had with both hands as to not mess up anything. Rebecca pulled out a large black covered tray with _delicious_ looking food in it; there was rice, vegetables, all sorts of steaming things in that one tray and it was _huge._ Like, about as long as Zamasu's forearm and hand combined. She turned around to showcase the delicious looking food to him. "Lookit. I bought three of these."

He nodded, right before he realized that she said it was for _her_. "Wait wait, you bought _three_ of these trays, Rebecca?" Is her stomach lowkey a bottomless pit?  
"I bought an extra one for you, silly." She laughed, placing a hand on his shoulder as she did so. Rebecca then went back, taking out the other two trays, the last one being in the second bag, followed by a can of a beverage, and a jar of…

"Are those… pickles?" Zamasu pointed to the jar that she just pulled out.

Rebecca casually looked at him. "Yup."

"Why?"

"I dunno, I've been craving pickles all day." She placed the jar down on the table. Don't women crave those type of things if they're pregnant? Or maybe he's just a dunce in this particular field of knowledge.

He'll go with the latter.

Zamasu watched as Rebecca folded the bags and placed them in the garbage. He frowned at the table of nothing but various delicious foods, how the _heck_ can she eat two trays? _Oh_ , he almost forgot. "Rebecca, Lexi called earlier and she sent you pictures of stuff."

"Stuff?"

"Yes." He gestured. "Her modeling… stuff."

"Oh. Okay!" She went upstairs, her phone was in her room, right where he left it. And he didn't actually take the time to look at the photos, he decided against that for reasons. Meanwhile, he went to one of the trays, he knew that hunger isn't something that's equipped in his body, but the food in the trays looked so _good_. He took one and decided that it wasn't gonna go to waste, taking his sweet time to eat in her dining room, as usual. Zamasu paused in the middle of eating, he felt another random pull, an intuitive one of course. There was something he felt that he needed to do, and that involved leaving the house again. He didn't rush his eating or anything, but the urge grew stronger and stronger with every passing minute.

Once he finished, the Kaioshin stood up and took the now empty tray and placed it into the trashbin, and started his trek out of the kitchen.

"Where are you going?"

Zamasu wasn't even by the door, he literally _just_ left the kitchen. And Rebecca was sitting in the living room with both of her trays, one of which was already empty and the other was _halfway done._ "Upstairs…"

"Oh." Rebecca nodded. She then looked down at her food for a moment, suddenly becoming quiet. "Can you stay for a while?"

The Kaioshin frowned. Didn't she want nothing to do with him this morning? "Ummm… why?"

"I just wanna… have you here for a moment." The redhead looked back at him, she patted the seat next to her. She was wearing a knitted oversized cardigan that looked warm and comfy for her petite body. It was tied around the middle, so he couldn't see what she was wearing underneath other than her black sweatpants. "You're not annoyed with me, are you?"

 _ **Yes.**_ "No, not really." It wasn't her fault for acting like this, somewhat. He really couldn't get upset even if he tried.

"I've been kinda… bitchy for the past three days. I'm sorry." She looked down at her lap.

Is he supposed to say 'It's fine'? That would be weird to say, Zamasu doesn't let humans go past him without atoning for their bad mouthing. He just nodded silently instead, it was a healthier alternative because he knew that her crankiness might come back. "You want me to sit next to you?"

"Kind of." Rebecca smiled, patting the seat again. "I'm watching something funny, you'll enjoy it."

Zamasu inhaled deeply, whatever instinct he had while he was eating could pass for now, he slowly approached the sofa and finally sat next to her. Almost instantly, Rebecca's hand was snaking its way around his sleeved toned arm, and she slightly pulled herself to him. Lexi _did_ say that women really liked soft and warm things, so her amplified behavior was understandable. The doctor looked up at him, and he looked down at her.

"Are you feeling okay?" Zamasu strangely felt compelled to ask her this, and she nodded.

"I'm fine now, I'm not in that much pain." She held him closer for a reason. "Maybe your body just heals people."

"Well, I am a _God_." Zamasu reiterated himself once more. "Of course I would have healing powers…. Is that why you're latching onto me like this?"

"You're really _sooooft_ , that's why..." She was practically tired too, and that was obvious from the way her head slumped on his shoulder. Zamasu decided to let her be and continued watching this weird show that was on.

Albeit he had to admit, the show was actually funny.

Once it ended and a long pause afterwards, Zamasu shifted slightly to look over at her control panel because she wasn't doing it herself. "Rebecc-" She fell sideways slowly as well, Zamasu realized that the doctor had fallen asleep on him. The Kaioshin moved himself from her, allowing her to lay down on the sofa. Being a kind person, he took the blanket that was balled up on the adjacent sofa, and placed it over her body. Zamasu watched momentarily as she snuggled into the blanket before he went to her living room door.

He decided to embark on going out somewhere and coming back quickly just in time for the doctor to still be asleep because at the moment, she was slumbering deeply. She wouldn't wake any time soon. Without wasting a breath or thought, Zamasu opened the door and stepped out, looking at the front garden and up at the evening sky. It's hue was a beautiful blue color, and he wondered why this particular area, or rather probably most of Tycho, didn't have such magnificent sky colors, like that one giant forest he was in several days ago. He slowly levitated, leaving the closed front door and Rebecca's mansion, and flew all the way forward.

He randomly decided to land at this one place because his nose picked up a very _charming_ scent of tea. It wasn't like his tea, but it was different, _eccentric_. This specific spot was actually a bakery or pastry shop, the outer colors were darkened mauve and brown, apparently its theme was mostly rich coffee colors. The outside also had a beautiful patio where people can sit outside and eat, and there were several people sitting here already. The tables had big umbrellas to usually block the sun, but today they were down because it was nice and breezy out compared to the past month, which was more warm than it was cool.

Zamasu approached the door, ignoring the momentary stares from those outside as he walked into the bakery. The first thing that hit his nose was indeed the tea, but a mixture of _sweet, fruity_ and _honey-like_ scents of various kinds. He should smell some saltiness in the air as well, but it was a nice touch to the sweetened aroma around the restaurant. The interior carried the same theme as the exterior, except the tables that were to the walls were booths, and the tables in the middle were given white accented chairs to compliment the white marbled tables.

He was so tempted to eat something _again_.

"Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin looked over to where that familiar voice came from. There was someone sitting in one of the booths, well actually _two_ people; the person that called him was Jay, and there was another man that resembled him. This man had black hair that was swept up in a well-kept undercut, and pretty much the same facial structure as Jay.

Zamasu approached the two, just as Jay popped another question. "Hey dude, what are you doing out here?"

"I was flying." He simply stated and the dude across from Jay cocked his neck back. His reaction was seldom comical. "And then I smelled tea, and now here I am."

"You can fly?" The black haired man across from Jay spoke up. Zamasu looked down at him.

"Yes."

He slowly nodded, looking at the Kaioshin for a moment, before turning to Jay. "How are you already friends with aliens, and you don't even work in ET researching?"

Technically, Zamasu _is_ an alien, but he'll straighten it out for the man later. Jay explained, "He's friends with Irene-"

" _No, I'm not._ "

Jay looked up at the suddenly soured Kaioshin, and was reminded of the first three months of this man being here, according to Irene. He corrected himself. "Irene was introduced to him, and she kinda took him in her place and… that's how we met." The guy still had a confused look on his face. "It's a long story."

"It's actually quite short." Zamasu looked at Jay. "I don't believe I know this man."

"Me neither, but I got you." The guy held his hand up, and Zamasu frowned. How come the people he's seen so far seen to have some sense of humor in their persona? "I'm Mace, Jay's cousin. Older, of course."

"You didn't need to add that." Jay looked at him.

"It's _important_ information." Mace smiled at his cousin before turning back to Zamasu. "I know your name already, he said it earlier. Nice to meet ya." Mace raised a hand to shake, and Zamasu looked down at his hand. This guy as well also doesn't seem to show any aversion to Zamasu's appearance either.

"You aren't in a hurry or something are you?" Jay said. "I was about to ask if you'd like to sit with us for a hot minute, because after this we're both gonna bounce."

"I don't need to go anywhere." Zamasu said. "I can stay." By the way, he's only doing this because he wanted to eat whatever is in this beautiful scented bakery, like… that's the only reason why he was here.

And also, he was somehow gravitated to coming here, as if he intuitively needed to.

Jay moved over so that Zamasu could sit. The Kaioshin looked down at the table, while Jay and Mace said something to one another. "Zamasu, do you want anything?" Jay looked at him, and the Kaioshin didn't need to think out his response.

"I never been here, but this place interests me. What do they have?"

Jay gave him the booklet. Zamasu looked inside, frowning at the stuff on this elegant laminated paper. There were cupcakes, cakes, other pastries, but one particular pastry caught his eye because of both it's name, and how it looked; it was a tart, an apple _rose_ tart to be exact. There were light white sprinkles of a sweetened powder on it, and the very tip of these rose tarts were an elegant red color, and its 'petals' were also a beautiful toasty color to compliment the red. He pointed. "I want this. Rose Tarts, and…" He noticed that there was a unique type of tea as well. "Black… tea? What is this?"

"Oh those tarts are _delicious_ dude." Mace smiled. "I had those once, and then pretty much everyday after work I come here and buy 'em. And uhh, Black tea is tea that's uhh… black, I guess?"

The waitress came by and Zamasu's eye _almost_ twitched because of her appearance, which he gravely mistaken. She had beautiful olive skin, her eyes were brown, and she had a curly afro that looked _just_ like Irene's, and for a moment he thought that was her. She walked up and asked what they'd like, her voice sounded beautiful and less… _Irene-y_. When she got to him, she blinked but didn't bat an eye, and he spoke in a weirdly clear voice.

"I'd like two rose tarts." Was all he requested.

"Alright." She tapped that down on her tablet and addressed the three males. "Your orders will be done in thirty minutes." With that, the woman walked away, and Zamasu looked at Mace. Mace returned that gaze to him.

"What is your occupation?" Zamasu had to ask, he got accustomed to meeting people and hearing what they do in their daily lives. He imagined this man to be kinda like June; someone who was familiar with seeing aliens, so much so that they don't give two toenails about one's appearance in the middle of a bakery.

"Me?" Mace said, and then he swayed as he sat up, his body language was so leisurely it greatly contrasted his job title. "I'm the director of the FPICA." He shrugged. "That's pretty much it."

" _That's pretty much a big deal._ " Jay chuckled, and Zamasu frowned. He had never heard of an _FPICA_ before. "That's the _Federal Police Investigation and Criminal Agency._ It's where all the high-end cops and detective stuff come from."

"I mean after a while, you get used to it." He shrugged again. "I make sure each and every investigation or search team is up to par here in Tycho."

You know, so they can fight crime efficiently."

Zamasu nodded. So this man works in the same career field as one who brings justice? There will be _questions_ asked. As far as Zamasu has seen, there hasn't been any direct crime except for the black vans which quieted down rapidly for some reason. Not to mention, the only thing he saw was some innocuous robber try to best Lexi, and that was it. He could imagine the amount of _responsibility_ this laid-back guy had, having to supervise and coordinate every single portion of crime fighters every single day. "And you direct _all_ of that?"

"Yep." Mace said. "Well, to be fair, there's subdivisions; each thing has their own leader, and each leader is supervised by another person or a _superleader_ , and eventually those people come to me with reports of how crimes sites are doing, investigations, etcetera etcetera…" Zamasu nodded. "So I'm not piled up with a bunch of work all of time, at least I don't think I am."

"So you've dealt with beings from other planets?" Zamasu was getting interested in what this man did. Having such a job, especially because he looked as young as Jay, was a feat in itself.

" _Kinda_ \- I mean, I personally never _spoke_ with other beings from outer space and stuff, you're my first." Mace smiled at him, and Zamasu almost cracked a smirk. _Almost_. "I know that government officials and some high-ranking super-AIs have spoke with other-world leaders, though."

At the word AI, Zamasu's ears perked up. He felt the need to ask about that. "What is an AI?"

"Artificial Intelligence." Was the simple answer from the both of them. "They're like us; they can think and some of them can speak like we do. A lot of them are even built the same way a human looks."

"Wait…" Zamasu sat up and pointed. "I've seen one of those before! _That's_ what they're called?"

"Wait, you did?" Mace frowned. "You don't catch many AI walking around here unless if you're in South City."

"There's a South City?"

It was time for the two relatives to frown at him in shock. "Bro, South City is the second biggest city here! Like… how do you not know the South?"

"It's that _techy_ city, where all the profound nerds go. Rebecca works there, ya know." Jay added.

Zamasu frowned. "Oh…" He seriously had never been there; the only three major cities he's been in so far are the East, West, and North.

"So, about that AI you saw. I probably might know who they are." Mace made a gesture saying 'bro tell me more, I'm invested', and Zamasu nodded.

"Well, I ran into him when I was at this weird place." _**Highly descriptive once again, Zamasu**_ _._ "I know he's an AI but I can't call him an 'it' because he's so humanlike, it's strange. He had this visor, and I believe his arms, neck and hands were yellow, and his eyes were blue…" Zamasu thought for a moment.

Mace blinked. "Okay, okay. Is that all you can recall?"

"I don't know his name, or... if he had a name, rather. I do remember he had a yellow hat or something…"

"Yellow hat?" Mace raised a brow. "What was he like when you spoke with him?"

"He was… he was, ummm…" What was that word that could have been used to describe the AI male? Oh _right._ "He was very... _blasé_."

"Blasé?" Mace said, and then he kissed his own teeth with an arising smile.

" _Chandler_?"  
"That's his name?" Zamasu furrowed a brow.

"Well, Chandler is the only AI I know who wear a yellow hat and has yellow… almost everything, and doesn't give two fucks 98 percent of time." It's quite amusing that Mace guessed who it was right after Zamasu used a word synonymous with nonchalance. Mace started to chuckle and then he shook his head downwards. "He's a character. He really is."

And Zamasu could tell, that AI Chandler was quite intelligent. You would see it in the way he presents him _self_. "How do you know him?"

"He used to be the main database of almost every governmental or confidential file in Tycho and probably the world, for that matter. He's been around for quite a while. And you know, government... police... we kinda mingle a lot. He's a powerhouse of knowledge, but that goes for all AI honestly."

A _powerhouse_ of knowledge… you know what, now Zamasu might actually have a concrete reason as to why he gets the urge to go back to that place again. No one actually _knows_ that he went there other than Chandler, if that's his name, and that mysterious man Mr. _Sarashina_.

The same afro haired woman came over with a tray of their drinks. Jay had fruity sparkling water, Mace had a bottle of ginger tea, and Zamasu's black tea was in this _beautiful_ gold and green cup. They thanked her and she regarded them with a sweet smile and an even sweeter 'You're welcome'. See, this is what Irene _could have_ been, but instead she's all ugly everywhere. _Ugh… moving on._

Perhaps that was why he came here, to end up getting answers to the questions he had over the past three-something days. Since he spent those three days in Rebecca's house, he's been questioning what the heck, or who the heck, were the people he ran into in less than a week, and why that man lived so far away from everyone else. Ever since that day he met this man, Zamasu would find that his exotic face would pop up in his head every once in awhile, and the more time that elapses, the more Zamasu _needed_ to know who he was.

"Where'd you run into Chandler? That guy doesn't go out and about in public a lot." Mace looked at him.

Zamasu was looking over at a window in the far front of the bakery. "He was in the same place this one man lives." Zamasu tried his absolute best to describe that place again. "There was this big laboratory building, and a lot of intricate crop circles and umm…"

Mace squinted. "Bro I dunno anybody who lives in a laboratory, _and_ has a bunch of crop circles. Do you know this guy's name?"

"I know his last name." Zamasu looked down for a moment. "I think it was… Mr. Sarashina, I believe?"

That was when both Mace _and_ Jay nearly choked on their drinks at the same time. Mace being the hella funny one of the two have him a shocked face that nearly cracked a smirk out of Zamasu. _Nearly_. " _MR. SARASHINA?!"_

The two of them practically exclaimed, but not enough to catch the attention of the most of the people in the bakery. Zamasu nodded, he might just have an answer to his last question. "Yes…"

"You mean Ambrose? _The_ AmbroseSarashina _\- that_ guy?!" Mace was practically leaning forward right now and Jay just looked at Zamasu in utter _shock_.

"...Umm" Zamasu frowned. "Ambrose is his name?" That name sounds _just_ as exotic as his handsome face.

"How do you _not know_ who he is?! And you live with _Rebecca_ of all people?" Jay frowned. "She's a doctor, so she should've told you a thing or two about him."

"So you just _casually_ stroll into where Ambrose lives and keep quiet about it?" Mace's eyes were narrowed at him. "How did you even find let alone _break into_ his place?"

Here we go, the explanation of how he got in. "I just flew there… on my own. I had no ship."

"Why do you have to add that you didn't have a ship?" Jay furrowed a brow. "I know you can fly just like that."

"I kinda just figured you didn't have a ship, because you don't look like you'd own one." How does one _look_ like they don't own a ship? Zamasu shook the question out of his head. "So you just flew there? That's it?"

"Well, yes." Zamasu nodded. "The place wasn't impenetrable." _But that building was. It definitely was._ He just has to be careful _next time._ "Is this man important?"

" _Yes._ " They both, once again, said at the same time.

"He's the _richest_ man on the planet!" Mace said. "And he's the top-tier engineer of... pretty much a lot of everything most or all people own nowadays."

"Oh." That could have meant nothing to the Kaioshin, because he's a God so… he really shouldn't care much about technology. But said technology made him hallucinate, and despite how malicious those attacks were for him being so intrusive, Zamasu can't seem to see any ill intention on the man even if he tried.

"Oh?" Mace frowned.

"Dude, he's a uhh… a really strong alien. Technology doesn't bother him." Jay shrugged, and Zamasu gave him a look before Jay leaned in to whisper to him. "Should I tell him that you're a God?"

Zamasu decided to say it himself. "I'm not just an alien. I'm a _God_ , a God of Creation to be exact."

"A uhh… God?" Mace was confused. "Then how are you here?"

That's the exact same thing Jay said the first time he saw Zamasu. "I can exist here too, Gods aren't limited to being in their own realms and no, we don't live in the sky either."

This was information Jay could have figured, but he never actually asked Zamasu about that either. Mace blinked. "So you have your own planet or galaxy or something?"

"We have our own realm."

"Oh shit." The director's eyes went wide. "That's metal as hell."

A frown. "That's what?"

"It's… it means a good thing, bro. Don't worry about it." Mace waved his hand, and Zamasu narrowed his eyes momentarily before something weird caught his senses, and his eyes, again.

It was the same weird energy he detected back in the gun shop, and now that he thought about it for some reason that same sense disappeared soon after he had picked it up. Also, he couldn't pinpoint such a thing exactly, but he found that most of what he detected harbored Nousha's body. This one was a bit farther away, however, and it was slightly less evident than before. It also wasn't nefarious or anything negative, but it was _there_. Zamasu looked over to the front booth where all the showcased desserts were; you can see the very top of the heads of people in the back room who were baking, and that's where Zamasu was feeling this weird _thing_ from. He watched as the heads themselves moved all around the back room, he couldn't see their faces at all.

One particular head caught his eyes, this person, he couldn't tell if they were male or female, had messy-bunned _rose pink_ colored hair that wasn't wearing one of those white hate that the other heads were wearing. He frowned, was that where this energy he's feeling was coming from? He had to say, that hue of the individual's hair looked rather elegant. A person came out of the side corridor with a large tray that had their food on it, and Zamasu was lowkey hoping for that pink haired human to come out and show themselves to him.

"Here's your food, you guys." The man set it down on their table before quickly placing Jay's tart pie, Mace's cakette, and Zamasu's rose tarts respectively to each male. "Enjoy." He gave them a kind smile, and then walked back to where he came from. Zamasu looked at the rose tarts, and realized that they looked a little different than the ones in the picture. The picture showed them with an red-orange hue to the petals, but these petals were slightly a rosy pink color, which would gradient with the natural, baked color of the apple tart. It looked so damn beautiful, Zamasu almost didn't want to eat it.

He looked at his fork and dessert spoon, taking it with both hands and proceeding to finally cut a piece of this tart. And yes, Zamasu has seen one or a couple of movies that showed someone eating a tart, so he knows a thing or two about tart _etiquette._ He's a God, all etiquettes are what make his species divine. With a piece of it resting on his elegant dessert spoon, the Kaioshin placed it into his mo-

You know, at this point, you could expect Zamasu to just straight up bust one right there in front of everyone else. Every single article of food that he has tried so far tasted amazing, and this one is no surprise; it tasted truly _divine._

He revelled in the taste overall, purposely taking his time eating his two beloved tarts while the other two men were near halfway done with their tart pies and cakettes. The trio pretty much ate in mostly silence, minus the conversation that went between Jay and Mace for a short while. Both human males were near done, while Zamasu had just finished his two rose tarts.

"Oh shit…" Jay suddenly remembered what he and Adrian had planned for the Kaioshin. "Zamasu, by the way, we've been thinking about giving you a phone because to reach you from Rebecca's phone all the time would be kind of annoying."

"I already know." Zamasu nodded. "Your girlfriend mentioned it to me over Rebecca's phone."

"Wait, when?"

"Earlier today." He said simply, taking a sweet sip of his black tea.

"Oh, alright, so you already know." Jay smiled, and then looked elsewhere. "I don't have it with me, it's at my house right now. Adrian wanted to drive over and give it to yo-"

Zamasu suddenly disappeared right in front of both Mace and Jay, which stunned both individuals because of his abrupt departure. They both looked at each other with confused and shocked looks on their faces, and then looked to see if anyone caught that little supernatural action. _Luckily_ , they didn't. A couple dozen seconds later, and Zamasu reappeared in his exact seat with the phone in his hand; it was a light touch screen device that was a chromatic green color around the edges, and the side buttons were black.

"Got it." The Kaioshin looked down at the black screen. Both men blinked at one another. "Adrian already told me how to turn this on and off, and how to call other people."

Jay looked at him. "You legit just teleported to my house?"

"Yes." His plain reply made the director's eyes widen.

"Wait so, what's the point of giving this dude a phone if he could just teleport to wherever he wants?"

Zamasu mentally vouched for Mace's inquiry. _Good question_. Jay answered for his cousin's confusion. "Easier access, and you knows this." He was referring to Zamasu. "What if you teleport into my room when I'm changing or some shit?"

 _An even better answer to that question_ , the last thing Zamasu wanted to see was another naked human being with his ultraHD mind vision. Not fun.

"Oh, that makes sense. _Euugh._ " Mace cringed at the idea. The three had completely finished eating, and engaged in a small conversation before departing. The whole time, Zamasu would occasionally glance back to see the heads behind the main counter. Once again, Zamasu could feel that same energy fading away gradually, the pink head was disappearing more often.

The Kaioshin recalled the reason why he left, and decided that he should go back to Rebecca's house. She might be awake by now, and he's been out of her home for about an hour or so. The trio stood up, and Jay regarded Zamasu nicely.

Mace held his hand out to shake. "It nice meeting ya, by the way."

Zamasu didn't look down at Mace's hand this time. He shook it. "It was nice meeting you, too." He found this cousin of Jay's to be more like Adrian; comical, semi-witty, and overall a tolerable person. He was less like Jay, who had silly streaks here and there, but Jay himself wasn't really much a funny guy. He started walking outside on his own while the other two males walked out as well, albeit slower because they were talking. He turned around. "Where are you two heading to?"

"Jay sucks at beer pong." Mace shrugged, and the younger cousin shot a look at him. "So he mustered up the 'bravery' to challenge me in it again."

"Going against you ain't even a challenge in the first place." He crossed his arms.

His cousin narrowed his eyes. " _Riiiight,_ anyways you got somewhere to go too?" Mace looked at Zamasu.

Zamasu nodded. "I'm going back to Rebecca's house." The Kaioshin assumed that Mace knew who that was. Well, obviously when someone dabbles into your financial stability, then your closest of family members usually would know. "Goodbye."

The two males bid him farewell, and he flew upwards, looking down at Mace's facial expression and allowing a chuckle to pass through his lips. The only reason he did that was because in the height he was at, nobody would be able to hear him.

He zoomed ahead and ended up above her mansion, looking about the landscape. At this height he can pretty much see some portion of East City on the far left to where he was. The suburban houses were another story, as they looked like tiny abodes from his view. He teleported straight into the living room, to see that Rebecca was _just_ waking up. He looked down at the phone in his hand, and then he leisurely lowered his arms so they were at his sides while he walked up the stairs. Ollie passed by him when he reached the corridor, the pug turned his whole directive around just to trail behind Zamasu and then bark to get his attention.

The God looked down at the dog, whose pudgy face was pressed against his leg because he wanted something. Zamasu frowned before Ollie went back into his room and returned back out kicking a giant, fluffy ball with his front paws.

Zamasu didn't even make the effort to bend down and grab the ball, he just telekinetically pulled it up to his hand. Ollie was once again barking as to why the ball suddenly floated to Zamasu's hand. The God looked down at him.

"I did that."

That was the simple confirmation Ollie needed.

Zamasu held the ball while heading for his room. His first objective was to see all the contacts Adrian had pre-place into his phone (because he was pretty and hoping that the music producer somehow forgot to add Irene's phone number, and hopefully she didn't have this one either), and perhaps see how this rectangular thingy worked. But that would have to wait, because Ollie wanted to play with him, and Zamasu wasn't the type of person to just _neglect_ innocent beings, he's too kind for any of that.

He opened his door, allowing Ollie in first while instructing the pug to stand somewhere away from his bed. Zamasu placed his phone down, and sat on the bed with the ball in his hand, and Ollie was already ready to catch it. Zamasu tossed it not directly in his direction, but to the right of Ollie to make it a bit more challenging. He did this several times, until he suddenly came up with a rather bright idea.

"Ollie." The pug was all ears as his intuition picked up the fact that Zamasu had something new for him. "I won't toss this to you, you'll have to get it from me." The Kaioshin lowered his hand from the edge of the bed so that the ball was level with Ollie's face.

Ollie barked, tilted his head, and started walking towards the ball. Zamasu smirked, the pug really thought that Zamasu would give this up _that_ easily; the second Ollie's mouth was a few inches from Zamasu's hand, the ball levitated a bit higher than Ollie's normal height. The pug backtracked quickly as he looked at the ball, while Zamasu crossed his arms. Ollie went for it again, he jumped up on his hind legs to catch it, but Zamasu telekinetically raised it higher. He started moving the ball away from the bed and made it run around the room while varying its height, and Ollie was soon chasing after the now floating, fluffy ball.

He'll take a bit of a moment from figuring out how his phone worked, this was more entertaining than anything he's done in the past three days.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **OKAY FIRST OF ALL, THE TITLE IS NOT A PUN FOR WHAT REBECCA IS GOING THROUGH! It legit came to me, and I didn't realize that until… well, I was really close to publishing the chapter. And by the way, this isn't behavior meant to generalize how women are on their period. The last chapter, it's hinted that Rebecca was (mentally) injured in some form. If you can connect a little bit of the dots, it might have something to do with why she behaves the way she does now. *sigh***

 **You know what's funny? Goku had four masters before he was finally taught by King Kai, and Rebecca is already being mentored by a Supreme Kai apprentice.**

 **You see an overall change in the way Zamasu is around her. As Rebecca is now his pupil, he removes the aspect of anything else and zeroes in on the fact that he is a mentor. If something that she's doing is considerably not right, he has to correct that. It's the same instinct that's been growing towards Ollie and Loki, except less paternal-like.**

 **I think one of the greater eye-opening things is the fact that he's exhibiting one of his biggest traits in a place he wouldn't have;** _ **learning**_ **. Gathering knowledge, and he does this by going out and exploring. You can say this same behavior was triggered right after he returned home with the guys. Now we have four new characters: Nousha, Ambrose, June and Chandler. Three out of four of them will appear more and more often in this story, I think you can guess whom.**

 **It would be sweet to ask who you think that pink-haired person was, I know it wasn't** _ **that**_ **ambiguous. Anyways, I think I'm done writing a bunch, see you all in the next chapter!**


	26. Utterly Unacceptable

**I'm so hype.**

 **Honestly, as overrated as it may seem, I can't wait for that one hour special tomorrow. Jiren vs Goku, the alpha makes a move? It's gonna be crazy; I'm not overexpecting anything from it, even from some of the spoilers as Toriyama can be a hecka troll sometimes. I vouch for that :P**

 **Okay, maybe I'm one of those weird people but I'm very interested in Jiren despite a lot of varying opinions saying he's either boring, or hyping him up just for brawns. Where he's from and the fact that he's in the Pride Troopers seems intriguing...**

 **I** _ **might**_ **just write something else as well; a different story, of course. I'll see how that goes…**

 **On with the chapter, shall we?** _ **Huehue**_

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 **Utterly Unacceptable**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Zamasu did take a bit of time to understand how his new phone worked, of course he didn't accidentally _call_ anyone but he did know the difference between texting and calling.

He's not that old, you guys; Zamasu is still hip and young.

Right after he had finished making Ollie, and soon Loki, chase after a floating ball, the Kaioshin paid full attention to seeing how this thing worked. The first app he went to was the messaging app. This app was conglomerated with calling, so it was pretty much all in one; for the first time, he clicked on the 'Contacts' bubble, and the screen transitioned to a scrollable list of people with their pictures. As he expected, he saw Adrian, James, and… Zamasu frowned, Jay's name looked different here; instead of it being Jay, it was Jukichi and the Kaioshin thought this was some random person until he noticed the picture itself. Ashley was there, and surprisingly Rebecca as well. He didn't think they would add Rebecca's number because of… certain circumstances, but it's quite thoughtful that they did so.

Now Lexi was also there, her picture was quite simple; she was outside in some tropical looking area, right in front of the camera with the sun in her face while wearing sunglasses. She appeared to not have any makeup too, and was holding the camera with both of her hands. It was a cute picture, he actually had to admit. And then there was Irene…

Her picture was simple, just her smiling and all that. He purposely vowed to ignore any possible interaction with her through this stupid phone.

He'll also have to get into the habit of actually _checking_ his phone, even though the Kaioshin didn't have much of a social life, he can tell that he'll easily forget this innocuous device's existence as the time passes. He aimlessly would look at each and every person's number as a means to better remember his phone instead. He happens to be one of those old school people who remembers actual phone numbers instead of just saving them into a directory.

At that moment he had realized that he can _add_ numbers as well! This was like groundbreaking information for him. He decided to input Nousha's number without much of a second thought. When he did, he tapped the button for add, and also instantly, her contact name along with her profile picture was in the contact list. Zamasu blinked at the picture, she was with someone else in the picture, and this particular person had that same rosy pink hair he saw a few hours ago.

The both of them were wearing comically giant sunglasses. Nousha was holding the side of it with her hand while puckering her lips at the camera, and the pink haired individual also had the same pair of sunglasses and was facing the camera puckering his lips in the same, playful fashion. Maybe he could be mistaken, but this man (he could figure out it was a man because of his face structure, despite it not being that prominent) had the same hue of pink hair he saw back in that bakery shop. Was this the same person? Was Nousha dating this man? He'll find out later when he actually sees her which would be three days from now.

It was now late at night, he assumed that Rebecca was in her room at the moment. Both Ollie and Loki were doing whatever the heck they do, and Zamasu took this time to try out this whole texting thing. He decided to go with the most tolerable person at the moment, even though there was about four of those type of individuals.

' **Hello.** '

A simple message to the person, because why not. He wondered why the person wasn't answering immediately, and then he realized that other people may not be as attached to their phones as Rebecca. Meaning, they were doing things _without_ it. Within about ten minutes came his reply, and the notification sound made him jump because he was in some deep thought.

' **I'm gonna assume this is Zamasu. If it is, then hey.** '

Zamasu blinked, so the number he had _was_ distributed to everyone within the group. He knew the model had this information before the others presumably. ' **How are you?** '

Her name wasn't actually her real name. That goes for pretty much everyone's names here; hers was LexiBabyy, which he won't entertain for even a millisecond. It didn't make sense to him so he asked her. ' **Why does your name look weird?** '

' **It's a username, you can change it to whatever you want or like… whatever fits you.** '

Oh, oh, he knew that. Zamasu asked how one does this, and she explained how to edit his own profile. Zamasu clicked on his name, which was preset as Zamasu by the guys, and decided to put a more fitting title before texting Lexi again.

God: **I see now**

LexiBabyy: **...you really changed your name to God.**

God: **You said a name that's fitting, did you not?**

LexiBabyy: **Well, yeah but like…**

God: **You should expect such a title from me.**

LexiBabyy: **-_- I shouldn't be surprised. What's up?**

He thought for a moment. There was nothing he had to say because he is a boring fuck. That's not him thinking that, that's the author saying it.

God: **I was trying to figure out how this works, so I sent a message to the first contact here.**

LexiBabyy: **I'm the first contact? I thought the list was in alphabetical order. o.O**

Dammit, now he had to lie; he chose her because she was… uhh… she was nice the last time they spoke. And she's interesting, in the most platonic way possible.

God: **I rearranged the order myself.**

A pause, before those three weird dots came up followed by her messages.

LexiBabyy: **Bullshit, you can't do that.**

LexiBaby: **My name can't be first, you deliberately went out of your way to pick me. :3**

God: **Watch your language, woman.**

Because it's the only thing he could rebuke back, because everything she said was right. But who says he can just _admit_ that? He noticed that she was taking awhile to answer back so he decided to rest his phone on his bed and went over to his _smarticles stash_ to get a book. He decided on a random pick, or a book called _Endmite_. From the blurb alone, he could tell its genre was science and supernatural. The cover and decor of the book looked amazing, it caught his eye almost instantly so he decided that would be his pick for the night…

Until his phone suddenly blared out some weird tune, which made him jump the _second_ time ever since he acquired it.

Zamasu stomped over to where the stupidly loud thing was, grabbing with anger and having that same anger subside a little when he realized it was Lexi calling. Why is she calling him? He still answered it, because he was courteous. "Hello."

"Haven't we gone over the whole _name_ thing before?"

He recalled her saying that before briefly, but he's being a dick. "Yes we have. Why ask?"

A quick sigh was heard on the other end. "Because you didn't use it, again."

"And you called me because of this?" Zamasu frowned, holding the book in one hand while sitting back down on his bed. "You didn't even greet me. That's very uncourteous of you, _Lexi._ "

She groaned. "Really? Alright… _hi_. And good, you used my actual name."

"It's not something difficult to do, woman." A smirk cracked through his lips.

He heard something being placed down, like metal against ceramic. She was probably eating. "You're getting a kick out of this, aren't you?"

"To be fair, it's a better noun to use compared to the word _human_." He crossed his free arm. "I'll try to use your name from now on. What are you doing over there?"

He heard her go 'hmmph' on the other end. So feisty for little reasons, that's not a friendly trait. "I ordered this really lavished room service. The food here is expensive and _amazing_."

"Oh? It is?" Zamasu raised a brow with a smile on his face.

" _Yes,_ and all this stuff is for _me_. Here, I'll give you some eye candy." If Lexi knew that he had a crush on her, she'd be a bigger dick and would've sent a picture of herself to him but that's besides the point. She snapped a picture quickly, and sent it to him and he received it immediately. According to what happened with Rebecca's phone, he kept it away from his ear to avoid that weird sensation again. "There. See how beautiful this is?"

"Hmmph." Zamasu opened the photo. The plates were so spotless clean, and it was also _decorated_ with the food that Lexi's been eating. This was in a hotel room, he presumed, because the carpeting looked like some hotel room and from the angle this picture was in, he could see a TV mounted on the wall with a stand below it that had potted plants on the side tables. Her food was also on a slider table that came with her couch and he could see her legs underneath. The various sizes of plates aligned in such an aesthetic way, that Zamasu was starting to consider the picture with greater intent. "How nice…"

"Yup, It's all mine, and I'm not saving shit. So you can't have any." Lexi smirked, knowing just how much Zamasu loved food from what Rebecca told her. She looked down at her plate for a moment, taking another sweet bite from her fancy silverware. A pause went on before she realized that the phone went silent, not that he hung up on her, there legit was nothing on the other end. Did he leave his room all of the sudden? "Zamasu?"

" _Are you sure about that?_ "

She didn't even fully hear what he said, because the model jumped so high that she banged her knees against the slider table. She also yelped loudly as she whipped around to see that Zamasu was _deadass right there behind her with his prickass hands behind his back._ The impact wasn't enough to make her drop everything, nor did it hurt her significantly, but she held her chest to slow her sudden racing heart down.

"Zamasu!" She moved the slider table, before standing up and glaring at him. "You scared the _shit_ out of me! Why the hell are you here?!"

"It is really late." The Kaioshin had this faint smirk on his face as he walked around her couch to sit right next to where her seat was. "You should keep your voice down."

"I would kick you." She shook her head, and then sigh before plopping back down on her seat. "Don't do that. That scared me a lot."

"I apologize." Zamasu said plainly, before reaching for some of her food. Lexi quickly slapped his hand away and he looked at her, offended. "Excuse me?"

"You should _ask_ first." Lexi raised a finger up at him. "I'm not giving you anything."

"I'm a God, you'll give me whatever I want you to give."

This is the author speaking over here. I dare you to take that sentence out of context. I _dare_ you.

Lexi narrowed her eyes at him. "I spent a _lot_ on this food, I'm not just gonna _share_ it."

"With the acclamation you happen to have, the cost of this food shouldn't even dent your finances."

He was actually right about that. "Okay, you're right. But _still…"_ Lexi held the slider table back with her hands. "Can't have any."

"You want me to get it myself?"

"I said you can't have any."

"Lexi," his voice was in a slight uptone. "I just want something little from there. Don't be so difficult."

"You flew out here," Lexi straight faced, "Just for my food?"

"I teleported here."

"..." Lexi rolled her eyes. "You are so extra."

"Extra?" Zamasu frowned. "How?"

"I only talked with you extensively _twice,_ and you're already here sitting in my hotel room trying to smuggle food from me." The pretty woman smiled as a tiny giggle escaped her hips, because Zamasu was reaching for it again. " _No_."

Zamasu sighed. Then he looked down at the carpet floor, his eyes trailing across the designed floor and finally reaching Lexi's exposed feet. She had really nice, soft looking feet, and he just now noticed that the model was wearing workout shorts that kindly hugged her figure. "I'm not leaving until I get some."

Lexi uncrossed her legs. "Well, I'm not giving you anything until you leave."

"If I leave, I wouldn't be able to get anything in the first place."

"Exactly." She gave a sweet smile, and that's when Zamasu became impatient. He raised a hand, and telekinetically took a macaron from one of her plates. Lexi turned around just in time to witness one green macaron float above her face, and then turned back to him with a cross look. "Zamasu!"

This fucker was already eating the treat with the most unapologetic smile on his face. "I'm sorry."

"No, you're not." She shook her head. "You got what you wanted, you should go home now."

"Are you chasing me out of your hotel?" Zamasu smirked. When did this guy get so smooth? "Fine then. I'll leave. Thank you for the treat, by the way."

Lexi narrowed her eyes, but she didn't give him a mean glare. The model was semi-smiling, she didn't expect him to be like _this_ at all. Zamasu didn't even stand, all he did was pause for a moment before disappearing out of her hotel room. Surprisingly enough, Lexi had realized that she didn't hang up, so she picked it up and placed it to her ear just in time to hear the intrusive God's voice.

"I'm back."

Was all he said. Lexi sneered. "I figured. You know what, I was about to tell you something great happened until you decided to barge into my place."

"Barging into your home would be quite noisy. I entered silently."

"...Karma's gonna bite you in the ass."

"Ah-ah, _language_ , human." He raised a finger as if she was in front of him. "I'm a God, karma would never affect the likes of me." Zamasu laid back down on his bed, reclined against his pillow. "What happened?"

He could _hear_ Lexi's pout, so the Kaioshin sighed. "Fine, I apologize for eating your food."

Lexi wasn't pouting, she was looking down at her macaron plate with her lower lip puckered at the fact that he took the last green one, which was her favorite flavor. "You owe me, regardless."

"I'll find a way to do something, if I want to." Zamasu shrugged. "I believe that's all for this call. I just wanted to know how this phone works, I didn't expect to have a conversation with you."

The model on the other end nodded. "Yup, that's _all_." She heard him chuckle on the other end. Despite his voice being very formal, his chuckle sounded mildly attractive on the phone. "It's very late here so I should eat, and then sleep."

"That's not a good habit to develop."

"I _know_ , I don't usually eat at night before going to bed, but I'm craving things right now." She chuckled.

Zamasu's eyes widen, as he shook his head. First it was Rebecca, now it's _Lexi_ too?! "Are you… about to menstruate or something?"

This made her laugh warmly. "Well, _kinda_. Don't think that all cravings are correlated to periods, dude. But I was walking around today and I felt that one random cramp out of nowhere so… I guess it's coming soon."

Hopefully she doesn't return and visit Rebecca and somehow doing something weird to him. He shook his head. "I see. Just don't do that again, it's not good for you."

"Okay _dad_." Lexi was joking about that statement, but because of the way he felt about her initially that statement was very conflicting. "I'ma go now, I'll talk to you like later or something. Bye."

"Goodbye." Lexi hung up before he did, which was reasonable because he didn't know how to hang up for a moment. He realized the red 'phone' button was for hanging up right after the call ended. The phone was redirected to the contact page, and Zamasu turned it off before setting it against his bed. He looked down at his new find, opening the book in his hand and proceeding to read it to pass the night, and a quarter of tomorrow.

!¡ !¡ !¡ !¡ !¡ !¡

Two days passed after that night, and Rebecca wasn't in as much pain as she used to be. In fact, those whole two days were days when she wasn't in work, so he was able to teach her a few more tidbits of martial arts. He was surprised to see that Rebecca was picking up rather quickly, of course she lacked in strength and power, but her hand-eye coordination was spot-on as well as her ability to focus. Already, the doctor was on the well-set path to learning how to fight, and he could imagine she'd be well-versed in intermediate self-defense within a few months.

Well, part of that was due to the fact that he did make her tea from his own tea leaves that subdued a lot of her cramps, which she thanks him wholeheartedly for.

Because she was a novice, he had to make sure her position as well as her posture was up to par, so he couldn't engage in something too difficult. She did basic blocks, countermoves and whatnot, mostly for defense tactics to avert an attack. They done this for the majority of the day, since Rebecca had rather exceptional stamina (from walking up and down in a hospital sometimes, that's understandable), until the sun started to set. Ollie and Loki would both watch the two occasionally as they did this outside in her backyard, their heads turning wherever the two went. After they had finished, the canine children exchanged looks to one another.

Rebecca entered her home pretty much… tired, and Zamasu casually strolled in to make tea. As a God, there is really no need to take showers, you could do anything you want and just _stay_ clean, but Rebecca immediately went upstairs to take a refreshing shower before coming back down in her 'house potato' attire.

Basically an oversized T-shirt, some trusty sweatpants, and messy bunned red hair.

She walked into the kitchen, still feeling really homely. This reminded her of highschool, when Adrian used to encourage her to go to the gym with him. Not that she was overweight, which she never was, but he always used to make fun of how weak she was. Every time they would finish, he'd go to her house, they'd freshen up, and then afterwards sit back, or go into her kitchen to whip up something nice. Sometimes she would do it, and Adrian would walk up to her and hold her while she was cooking. The overall tenderness of him made her smile, reminiscing those days when she used to momentarily relinquish how loving he was. Well, maybe he still is now, that much is certain with him and Ashley since you won't find them going anywhere without the couple laughing, but she missed that kind of contact. To be fair, she sort of missed him too.

Now, there was the quite Kaioshin in front of her pouring tea into his cup like some sort of skilled barista. It's not that he was flipping the cup itself and doing all kinds of acrobatics with it, he was just that meticulous by heart. Rebecca walked up to him and tapped his shoulder, _almost_ running her hand down his back because of her thoughts. He turned to her right when she removed her hand. "What do you wanna watch?"

Zamasu, to be fair, didn't want to watch a movie at the moment. He didn't finish Endmite, he purposely put it to the side because it was so interesting, and he didn't want to finish it in one night. "I'd rather read tonight."

She became a little dejected, because whenever he reads, he does it away from anyone else. She kind of wanted him to sit next to her again, without no sort of emotional attachment of course, but just for the contact alone. "Oh…"

"Why ask?"

He wasn't facing her. He had his tea in one hand, and the complemented saucer in another. Rebecca looked down. "I wanted to… sit with you."

Zamasu can sense it, her yearning for contact. The intuitive Kaioshin decided to go with it anyway, a book is portable of course. "Okay."

"Huh?"

"I said okay." He walked right passed her, going to the living room, placing the saucer with the tea on the coffee table. He then looked back at her. "Put something on, and watch it. I'll stay down here and read instead."

He teleported back to his room, and then back to where he was originally with the book in his hand before sitting down. Rebecca had a faint smile on her face, following his path and finally sitting next to him to put something on while he was reading. The doctor decided on behalf of a movie, she did all the little things on her control panel and once the movie started playing, she leaned back, bringing herself a bit closer to the Kaioshin in general. Despite him not doing exactly what she was doing, nor was he holding her either, she still felt the same warmth that she had when she slept on him before. Zamasu wasn't being stoic, and maybe that's why she enjoys being next to him, and also because she herself is slowly starting to accept that this was what she missed.

She could say all she wanted to about being a lone wolf, and taking pride in that, but right now Rebecca didn't want to pull away from the God next to her. She wanted to be closer to him, but right after she would, she felt like something else was pulling her back. That's basically from the years she spent bottling up her experiences and true feelings from everyone she knew, even Irene. Her best friend could be one of her greatest assets to letting go, but she'd rather not do that to her. It would be kind of pointless to tell her anything, or to tell a lot of people anything.

You ever told someone something, and because they know that information, _you_ can't think or act the same way as you did beforehand? It's like that, if someone knows a big portion of what happened to her, she feels like she'd be locked in some way, because if she pisses them off they could probably purge whatever trust she tried to build up. Yes, a past of living a social life filled with taking advantage of people does come back to bite your tits, in the form of paranoia. Slowly, perhaps knowingly or unknowingly, Zamasu was breaking that very tiny, very powerful part of her.

And he's only been here for what, two weeks now?

Rebecca knows that she doesn't want to pursue anything deeper with Zamasu, for some reason she was keen on not confusing her actions with wanting to be with him. Whenever such a thing is brought up in her mind, and when Zamasu is there, she shuts it down because she's reminded of how selfish she can oftentimes be. If that thought of consideration happened, she probably would have to tried to cajole the Kaioshin, would have flirted with him more and more, and simultaneously push him away right after. But Zamasu is not like that, he doesn't let people run through him and she can _feel_ that dominance over him. It's that factor alone that she gets attracted to, and knowing that it can't be subjugated reminds her of the improvement that she needs to make.

Zamasu isn't the only one who exhibits this behavior. Adrian does, but she already dated him, she saw how warm hearted he used to be. But he grew up, and he found out that his kindest efforts don't always give him what he deserves. _Jay_ is Zamasu's mirror in the dominant aspect, he is just like the Kaioshin; kind of standoffish and overall neutral, but underneath that holds a lot of tenderness in him. Jay is truly a warm hearted person, but that's very hard to see, just like it is with Zamasu. For Adrian, you could _see_ his kindness, but you can also see how uncareful he was with it when he was younger, and how it has affected him. She only knew this from Lexi, who pretty much hangs out with the guys all the time.

James is as dominant as both Jay and Zamasu, but in a different way. He actually has more in common with the Kaioshin than Jay, because he's defensive and will pretty much defend anyone he loves without a hitch. Zamasu is like that with his concepts, with his thought process… and with Ollie and Loki. Those two have become pretty much his children at this point, and his hatred or dislike of humans is something he would never forfeit, even if he _did_ actually like them. James is like that with Irene, he loves her enough to protect her from anything, and there is not that many things James outright _loves_.

She doesn't recall her last boyfriend being that way in the long run. After a while, he became emotionally abusive, not being around whenever she wanted and even needed him most. This helped in breeding up the need to keep things in her instead of telling others, but that relationship's effects weren't as profound as what took place in high school. The doctor refused to recall it, even though her memory may be lacking a lot more than it _should_ , she only wished that she could forget those horrible memories.

As she watched the movie, and concurrently thought to herself, she slowly held onto his arm, hands feeling the muscles underneath his gi. Zamasu wasn't a big guy, he was lean but _perfect_ since his body was godly, and she's only seen the top portion of that same figure. Rebecca wasn't into muscular men, she really liked lean builds like the ones that Adrian, Jay and Zamasu had, and also really attractive voices. Yes, James has one heck of a nice voice, but she never realized how weirdly _attractive_ Zamasu's formal voice is. Even though he speaks like his personality has never not been synonymous with a tree stump, she found that same authoritarian voice of his to be… interesting in certain made-up instances. Just for fun, at one point, she thought of how'd he sound if he was put in a _romantic_ situation and realized that he'd probably kill a woman with his dominant voice alone.

" _Rebecca_."

She also jumped at how stern he sounded, and she didn't realize that she was overly caressing his arm. He was frowning down at her, blinking twice before speaking again. "Stop that."

She just blinked up at him. What do you know when you realized you were thinking about some guy's voice in a sexual manner, and the same guy is sitting next to you and happens to be telepathic? _Did he read my mind, is that what he's telling me to stop or this…_ Her hands were still on his arm but she shifted to keep them at a safer position. "I'm... sorry…"

"What were you thinking about?" Zamasu could see that she had something odd going through her head. He wasn't intrusive (ahem) so he did not pry into her thoughts while reading his book.

Rebecca lifted her hands against his arm. "Umm… stuff."

"What _kind_ of stuff?" He said. "You look frustrated."

Rebecca started to blush. " _Don't worry about iiiiit."_ She quickly placed her focus on the movie, refusing to look back at him.

"Excuse me?" She didn't respond, she just pursed her lips together. Zamasu narrowed his eyes, and then gripped one of her wrists which surely made the woman whip her gaze back to him.

"H-huh?"

"Whatever you were thinking about is frustrating you. Tell me what it is."

Rebecca should be _happy_ that he probably couldn't tell that she was thinking of rather _lewd_ things about him and that's, unadmittedly, what caused her frustration. Her face got pink and she smiled conservatively. "I like your voice." And that's it, that's all she said before turning back to the movie.

Zamasu blinked once, twice, and then he looked down at her hands and back to her. "You're weird. What about my voice makes you blush?"

"Alright-you know what-" she suddenly released her hands from him and faced the Kaioshin directly. Rebecca decided to get it over with. "Your voice sounds… kinda sexy sometimes, that's what I was thinking about, okay?!"

"...How?" He frowned and looked to the side trying to understand the geometry behind this shit. It's not like he thinks he's _not_ umm… sexy or anything, it's just the he doesn't see that in his voice. That's weird. "What is wrong with you?"

"Listen." Rebecca raised a finger in front of him. "I haven't had some in _years_ , okay. Sometimes I end up thinking about stuff like that. Don't judge me."

Zamasu cocked his neck back. He was still confused. "Had some of what?"

" _SEX_." She exasperatedly said before soundly leaning back with her arms crossed. His mind is so far away from anything guttery, dammit.

 _Ohhh,_ this is gonna get awkward really soon.

"So why can't you ju- wait, nevermind." Zamasu shook his head, retracting what he was about to say because of its promiscuous nature. He looked down at the ground, while Rebecca looked at him.

"Why can't I just _what_? Masturbate?" That wasn't even what he was thinking about, but the fact that she just _said_ that plainly made his eyes widen. This topic was something he didn't like to touch upon, _literally_. "I would, but you're here, and I don't think you'd want to hear any… sounds and things like that."

Would it be wise for him to pinpoint that he _wasn't_ about to say that? Because his actual statement was worse than that. "Uhh…" He seriously didn't know what to say. "You could have left it at that, you didn't need to tell me anything more."

She frowned, and then sighed. "You asked, though. So…"

"No no, I didn't ask for you to _explain_ why you can't gratify yourself." Zamasu straight faced.

"What's said has been said." She refused to push the topic any further, because then things might be insinuated. Not because of him of course, but because she just hasn't had enough action. "Just… read your book, forget about me. I'll shut up."

"Good." Zamasu did just that, he went back into reading Endmite and honestly, pretty much got lost into it because it was so interesting. The story was about an intelligent robot, named T3-R-MITE who was made to serve and accommodate humans. The robot itself could not speak, it could communicate with only its body movement, and was solely programmed for the use of others. The planet itself was then visited by a civilized alien species, who were only there to collect certain samples from the planet with permission, but the humans were rash enough to go directly into attacking them. The human race was warned once not to _pester_ the species, for they are doing this for research, but after they went at it again, the planet was subsequently under attack. T3-R was taken along with a few others and instead of being subjected to slavery as it usually was, the robot was given free reign to do whatever it wanted because the aliens realized that they didn't need it.

Because it doesn't know what to do outside of serving others, T3R was slowly breaking down under its own purposelessness, until an opportunity opened itself for T3-R to finally do something. The story itself addressed the meaning of _living_ , the feeling of not having or fulfilling one's purpose channeled through a supposed-to-be two dimensional being. A mere robot, when it has a semblance of consciousness, will realize quickly that their environment has been wiped away from them, and for a human that would cause insanity. For a robot, it would cause error messages, and failsafes.

It was an interesting perspective, so much so that Zamasu was taking his sweet time to dissect all the things involved in the plot, realizing that there was more to whatever he would find. It was _satisfying_. This June Mayerly woman was no doubt talented, he had to admit it himself.

He had completed the book, almost upset that he had finished the story far too quickly. He had so many questions to ask, he wanted to know what had encouraged Ms. Mayerly to write this piece of work, it was _superb_. The ending itself was satisfying, the fact that T3-R had found solace with a race that wasn't cruel enough to inhibit him from using his full consciousness. Instead, T3-R fought alongside the aliens because the humans were interfering with their systems, and were actually _trying_ to go to war with them because of the aliens' semi-benevolence of not killing anyone in that planet. Mind you, this was _beyond_ the technology that was available now.

Or maybe it wasn't, Zamasu didn't know how _meticulous_ public technology could be, and he doubted that 90 percent of the tech that was in Ambrose's general premise was even _public_ knowledge.

Suddenly, he realized something rather depressing. After T3-R was augmented to fight, and during the war itself which was fought in the aliens' planetary system, T3-R started to internally fall apart. It became confused because it wasn't _supposed_ to think for itself, there were no other orders for it to take so it would malfunction and go 'insane'. At one point it started shooting out random bullets aimlessly while loudly whirring before collapsing on the ground, only allowing misplaced beeps to poorly communicate its internal struggle.

If anything, Zamasu never read something as emotionally conflicting as that. It was just a simple _robot_ , and the book alone made him feelsy especially the ending. There is a sad, unfortunate reason as to why it is called Endmite.

"Zamasu, I'm gonna… sleep…" Rebecca yawned mid-sentence before looking at Zamasu with a tired smile. He nodded, seeing that she was getting up, and he looked back at Endmite; he needed to know more behind this book.

"Wait." He raised a hand, and Rebecca turned back to him. "You're affiliated with June Mayerly, correct?"

Rebecca nodded. "Yeah…" Then she looked at the book he was reading, it was something that Irene brought over to her home before and forgot about it, but the doctor never really got into reading it. "You wanna talk to her about that book?"

"Yes." Zamasu looked down. "Where is she located?"

"Uhh, I can give you the address to her office, it's near her house." She frowned, pulling out her phone from her pocket (yes, she's wearing women sweatpants and they have deep pockets. This is U10 guys, this planet has their game stepped up), and then typing away to who Zamasu assumed was June. Meanwhile, he was just casually reading the blurb over again, and then Rebecca spoke up. "She's in her office doing something, but she said she wouldn't mind if you'd like to visit her."

Rebecca gave him the address, which he could remember easily, before finally bidding him goodnight in a yawny voice. Once she left to go upstairs, Zamasu stood up and made himself another cup of tea, silently drinking while staring outside at the dark sky before going back upstairs to get his boots, and leave through his own window.

Okay, here's the thing; before Zamasu even embarked on this quest of inquisition, he realized that he didn't know how this whole 'address' thing worked. So it was late at night, and he had to ask Jay (Lexi was probably asleep by now) how to determine an address, that's literally what he asked. Jay gave him the quickest shortcut, all he had to do was use the preinstalled app called Geo, which works like a GPS. Zamasu typed in the address Rebecca had told him, and flew out of her home while staring down at his phone watching the middle mark move towards the destination, and once he got there he touched ground with the rather formal looking building, but it was connected to what looked like a house.

As far as Zamasu knew, Rebecca said _near_ , and the two premises are literally conjoined at the hip. The exterior was very modern looking and sharp, mostly of different shades of blue and some white, her front yard had many plants and was well kempt, as if the grass was cut not long ago. Zamasu went to her door, he was polite, he rang the doorbell and was greeted with the kind face of the talented writer herself.

"Hello." Zamasu greeted her, both hands were clasped behind his back.

"Hey there, I know we've met before." June's smile seemed to get even bigger as she looked at him. "Rebecca told me that you really loved my book and wanted to talk about it." He nodded, and she stepped over to let him enter her home. Zamasu did so while looking around the office room; it was pretty lofty, kind of like the one he saw in Chandler's home. Once again, the modern theme of the home wasn't lost, everything within her house looked spick and span, it seemed like this place was cleaned very recently. Another thing that pleasantly hit his nose was the _inspiring_ scent of citrus that didn't heavily coat the room. June pointed to one of the seats in the couch area of her office room with a smile, looking outside momentarily as she finally closed her door.

●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●

Terry wasn't a karate expert, but he was capable of defending for himself pretty darn well. And that's just what he did while he walked through the outskirts of South City. It was one of the things he does a lot at night, walking was very therapeutic to the gynecologist, it was a way to get all the both physical and mental stress out of him. But right now was not the case.

He was barely able to dodge the bayonet knife that could have sliced his neck when the perpetrator came at him again with a direct jab that _just_ missed Terry's side. The gyne himself momentarily looked down at his now ripped sweatshirt cardigan, and another liege of the attackers punched him in the face.

Terry stumbled back, not enough to fall completely, but he had to hold himself up before reflexively swinging back and looking at all _four_ of the adverse males in front of him. Terry was a nice 6 foot, but the size and bulk of these men _dwarfed_ his stature, and two out of four of them were armed with either a knife, or a taser. Unfortunately for him, he didn't come armed at all, and was pretty much caught by surprise when one of them attempted to stab his back.

"Who the hell are you?" Such a question was kinda pointless to ask because they already started fighting, but Terry wanted to know why they specifically targeted _him_.

"Stay away from her." The one with the dumbass mask said. He was unarmed, but stocky and scary looking.

Terry frowned. "What?"

The bayonet man stepped forward. "If you keep trying to help her, she'll get you killed."

This is about Rebecca, he figured that much. But who are these violent people to tell him not to keep his associate safe? The fact that they know about her was scary in itself, and he could assume that these men were affiliated with those black vans. "And how do you know this? Who are you all?"

"You don't need to worry about that." The bayonet man charged at him again. Luckily, because of how big he was, he wasn't that fast, so Terry easily evaded his swing but then he realized that the guy swung sloppily on _purpose_. This only came true to Terry when he received another punch to the face by the masked man, before being grabbed by the shoulders and kneed straight to the stomach. He didn't have enough time to quickly recover because he was suddenly being barraged with punches and kicks to the point where he ended up on the floor, and all he could do was block all the vital parts of his body that would've been fatally injured. He held himself in a curled up ball, having the sacrifice getting kicked and punched on his back, and he held the back of his neck despite his nose already bleeding onto his sleeves.

The beatdown abruptly stopped, and the masked man looked down at Terry before nodding to the man with a taser. He smirked. "You know that woman is dangerous, right? All your sappy efforts won't do anything for you, care about yourself first."

"Shut the fuck up!" Terry was still on the ground, wincing right after he said that because he was harshly kicked on the back. He was grabbed by his hair with a gloved hand and raised with one arm by the man with the taser until he was eye-level with him and a few feet above the air. The man cracked the taser on in front of Terry to scare him, beckoning it closer to the gynecologist who kept moving under his grip. A swift kick was delivered to Terry's chest causing him to start coughing and momentarily staying somewhat still from the loss of air, and then the taser was placed to his side racketing very low electrical shocks through Terry's body. He pulled it back a second later, and did it again as the defenseless man strained screams in agony.

The group wasn't aware of another car rolling by. The car's windows were down so the driver could here what was going on in that alley. This made the driver frown, as he approached the alley's opening in his car seeing a group of males taze some guy while holding his hair. He shook his head, and his car door automatically opened upwards and he got out, allowing the car door to close silently.

"Hey!"

The group stopped their torture wreck, at this point Terry was trembling, and looked at the man that just left his car. They exchanged looks, and then casually dropped Terry to address the somewhat calm man in front of them. They couldn't see his face because the alley was shadowed.

"You might wanna leave, before we beat the shit out of you too." The aggressive bayonet man crossed his arms, as the two unarmed dudes walked towards the other man simultaneously. They both swung quickly, aiming to punch the man in his face but he dodged swiftly before using both his hands to flip the man on the right over on his back. The other man was given a swift hit to the stomach before a strong palm impacted his chest. The other two perpetrators watched as this took place in mere seconds, and the man's face came into view. His hair was tied back, he had black facial hair, and was wearing a simple white shirt with black pants.

The bayonet and taser man backed away inadvertently, because this man was _super famous_. What the heck is a celebrity doing outside of their own mansion? They looked at each other, and hesitantly approached the man. The bayonet man tossed his knife to hold it parallel to his forearm and lashed out to gash the man's chest, but the man grabbed his arm just in time and twisted his arm, not to dislocate it, but fast enough to flip the bayonet man over on his back. Concurrently, he kicked the taser man back and turned around to fully send a flying kick to his chest, and he landed on the two unequipped males who were just about to get up.

Terry watched as this man pretty much wiped the floor with these big guys, so much so that the males actually turned tail and ran. The gynecologist brought himself up on shaky arms while wiping his nose, and the man came over to help him sit up.

"You shouldn't get up so quickly."

At first, Terry nodded at the advice that he was given, but then he paused when he realized the well-known accented voice of the actor who saved him from being possibly killed. He slowly looked up at the face of the Mongolian man who was regarding him kindly. "... _Shona?_ "

What are the _odds_ , that he would get beat the heck up and meet one of his favorite karate superactors in _one night?_

Shona smiled at the stunned gynecologist as he slowly helped Terry up. The actor dusted off his shirt and looked over his chest. "Why are you walking outside so late?"

Terry could ask him the _same_ question, especially because this famous rich guy was driving around in South City at… what time is it? "I was walking around, I just kinda… walk around at night a lot."

He was scratching the back of his head and nervously chuckling even though he winced, but Shona could hear that Terry was having a hard time breathing from being kicked on the chest. "I might have to take you to the hospital, you're not breathing right."

Terry nodded again, holding his chest and Shona was beside him making sure Terry didn't just capsize abruptly. The superactor went into his pocket and pressed a button on his car keys that allowed his car doors to open upwards automatically. Terry sat in the front passenger seat of this expensive car, that belonged to the most famous martial arts actor, who just now closed his car doors and was sitting _right next to him_.

His chest injuries weren't the only reason Terry was having a hard time breathing.

"The hospital is a bit far away from here, I'm not even sure if they're open but I'll see." Shona looked over at him. "You can still somewhat breath, right?"

"Huh? Oh, umm… yeah…" The gynecologist wasn't a gusher at all, but he was still trying to process whether or not this id actually happening. " is open twenty four-seven…"

"Oh, it is?" As Shona drove, Terry realized that this car was so _smooth_. You ever sat in a car and felt satisfied with the lack of mini-hopping that you do in a car? It's like that. Well sure, the vehicles used nowadays are mostly hover cars, but that doesn't mean they _can't_ do that. The superactor would occasionally look at Terry as he spoke. "And you work there, right?"

Terry blinked. The way Shona said that sounded like he _had a feeling_ that he knew who Terry was. "Well, yes."

They reached a stop light, and Shona took a close look at him, before smiling and looking back at the road. "So you're Terry Wu, I believe? I've heard of you from someone before- unless if I'm mistaken."

How the _green elf heck_ did Shona know who _he_ , some random gynecologist, was? Shona raised his hands slightly with a tiny smile as if he reconciled his statement just in case Terry Wu wasn't _Terry Wu_. "Oh-no, yeah that's me, umm…" He scratched his head again. "Who told you about me?"

"My aunt." The light turned green, and Shona accelerated. "She described me to you and said that you were a nice person."

There might be more to that, but Terry was too busy comprehending the _luck_ that he apparently had. "Oh… Thank you..." His eyes trailed around the car, which was mostly black with burgundy red accents. There were lights around the front dashboard and speedometers were in an accented red hue, even the seats had accented lights. Terry blinked, this car was probably worth _millions_.

"Why were they after you?"

Terry looked back at Shona. At first he questioned what he said, before registering the question. It wasn't a good thing to lie, but it also wasn't reasonable to tell a _stranger_ about the fact that a small-scale bunch of crime junkies were after one of his close associates. "Umm, they just randomly came after me. You know, some guys just want to fight or something, I dunno."

Oh, he _did_ know. In fact, ever since that last bout where he took Rebecca to the hospital, Terry's been having questionable things happen to him. At first, it was his car being keyed whenever he'd work late, or there would be sketchy people walking past the parking lot when he was there, and at one point his car window was broken into and they for some reason didn't steal anything. They haven't actually went to his house, they don't know where he lives. He had called Rebecca and asked if she was okay, and she would always tell him that she was, but he always thought she'd keep quiet on whatever took place near her.

She isn't lying when she says she's okay. Terry doesn't know that.

Now, he had suspected that at some point over this week, he was occasionally being followed, because no one else would be out this late. Not only that, they were really far away from him as he strolled along the darker portions of South City, but they would trace his every move to the point where Terry would have to fast-walk out of wherever he was. Luckily, he found salvage out of this kind man next to him, otherwise Terry probably would have been tased and beaten until he lost consciousness.

"Are you sure about that?" Shona frowned. "They all had this weird tag on them or something, all four of them."

 _Weird tag?_ Terry didn't notice, but Shona despite quickly dispatching of the men noticed that they had this tag specifically on their left chest. It was a circle inside of a broken rotated rectangle, and the logo itself was simple but Shona had a feeling that this wasn't some _random_ group of guys just looking for a fight. The gynecologist frowned. "A tag?"

"Yes." Shona flickered his gaze at Terry, already seeing that his voice was getting really breathy. He had been driving for awhile, and was probably several minutes away. "They seem to be a part of some organization. Do they have some problem with you?"

 _Yes they do._ "I didn't know they had those tags." Terry wasn't the best liar, and his statement made Shona give him a look. "I mean-well, okay… it's… it's a long story."

Shona nodded slowly. Terry looked at him, somewhat considering how nice this man was to actually _stop_ a fight, and take him to the hospital on his own time. That led to Terry asking an important question. "I don't mean to be rude but… how come you're out _here_ this late?"

Is it normal to ask a celebrity why they are driving around South in their own volition? Shona still answered him to a slight smirk. "I was busy, and I didn't feel like sleeping so I just… drove around." The superactor shrugged.

They arrived at , parking within the lot since it was still open, and several workers that were already leaving stopped and stared at the expensive car that just rolled by and into the parking lot. When they saw _who_ got out of the car, they were straight stunned, as Shona helped Terry out of the car because the gynecologist was in some serious respiratory trouble at the moment. Shona entered the lobby of the hospital, looking at the nurses who were just staring at him and Terry.

"He's having a hard time breathing." That's all he had to say, before Terry was taken to one of the emergency rooms. The gynecologist shook his head as he was rushed away from the martial artist, there was a _lot_ of explaining he had to do.

Just outside the parking lot, a black van on the other side of the avenue kept note of who came out of that expensive sleek-black car. They were notified that the four men sent out to kill Terry were interrupted, and beaten down by the younger martial artist. The individual in the driver's seat looked down at his notepad, speaking into his bluetooth.

"We got another one."

"Another? Who?" The male on the other end asked.

"Shona." He scribbled stuff down on the notepad.

"Shona? _The actor_ Shona?"

"Yes." He was clicking his pen, just about to scribble down the actor's full name.

There was a pause, before a slight 'hmmph' was heard from the other end. "...Keep him. No one else should know about any of this."

"Right." The driver finally placed his notepad down before sending out a message to the main directory of his group circle from his phone. He checked the time, which was 2:20 AM, then tossed the device to his front passenger seat. Revving up his car, he wasted no time into driving out and away from the hospital with the new information. Looks like the doctor had more arsenal than their people had thought, if a famous person were to see even their tags, a portion of their operations would be purged. He drummed his fingers against the steering wheel, knowing that they had to act before something obstructs them.

But he also knew, that for any criminal, time is the _best_ asset that man could use.

ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR ЯR

Everything about that meetup was a bad idea.

This whole trip was a bad idea.

Deciding on behalf this trip was a _bad idea_.

Zamasu, with all his due means and reasons, sorely wanted to get out of that place. He may have been interested in asking June about the information in that movie that was portrayed off of her book, he reckoned the screenwriter would actually give him quite the explanation. And she did, she did indeed, June had no problem answering his questions, so that he wasn't creeped out about. Perhaps he was paranoid, perhaps he should curse his horridly acute senses, but he could have _sworn_ if he didn't leave as early as he did then June would've had something else in store for him. Say whatever you want, say whatever you can, but Zamasu accidentally sensed it clear as day…

That woman was _horny_.

And no, it's not like she had some other human male or female catering to her desires and she, being in some sort of intermission, just so happened to be in time with Zamasu's teleporting to her office. June was getting progressively turned on with every word he spoke, every breath he took, and every movement he made. Even the word horny isn't in his vocabulary, and it felt weird to equate that with what he had _sensed_ , but it was true. Now, he understood the extent of those weird stares he was getting at the airport, except June's was multiplied tenfold.

As a God, obviously Gods are meant to be beautiful, both inside and out, so it's obvious that Zamasu's beautiful being would get such loving stares. Do humans even like aliens? Technically that's what he was to the majority of people who stumble upon him, are humans into species unlike their own? Is that a thing? Why would they look at him with such carnal timbre?

 _As a God, Gods are meant to be beautiful-_ no no, they _are_ indeed, but they're not sexual objects! But then again, it's not world-knowledge that Zamasu happens to be a God. So what, did they think he was some gorgeous bed-tier alien from a green planet? _So gross,_ he shook his head, _humans are disgusting._

It's funny because he's not even flying anymore, he's walking through the streets of West City with his head down and his gaze downcast in startled and angered thought, still wearing his usual garb. As urbanized as West City is, there wasn't anyone out at this time to witness the sight of an angry inch-under-six-foot green Kaioshin fast-walking in utter embarrassment, and frankly nobody would've really cared which would be a good thing.

Maybe Lexi was right; karma _can_ bite him in the ass.

There weren't many cars because it was _dead_ in the night, and this particular area was actually one of the quieter portions of West City when it's this late at night. He could have flew, but his paranoia was so onset at the moment that he had to _walk_ out these events before flying again.

He just needed some time, time to think or something, he didn't really kno-

Someone randomly bumped into him, the person apparently had a portfolio of things in their arm which collided with Zamasu's side and ended up on the floor. Almost instantly, before Zamasu even turned around to yell at the person, they apologized profusely.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry-" The young man who was now going to quickly gather his portfolio looked frantic as he did so. Zamasu figured that it wasn't because of bumping into him, this man seemed to be in a hurry.

His quick apologizing should have satisfied the Kaioshin, but it instead got him annoyed. "You can stop apologizing now."

The man looked at him, he had blue eyes and fair skin with very miniscule stubble, of course not looking like he had questionable hygiene. His hair was mostly brown but some strands were highlighted, and in a messy undercut. He was also wearing a blue dress shirt, beige pants with brown loafers, and had a suitcase in his hand. He stood straight, like _so_ stiffly straight, it even made Zamasu a little uncomfortable. "Oh, um, right. I'm sorry- I mean…"

Yup, he was one of those people.

Zamasu just nodded, and raised his hand before the other man spoke again. "Okay, okay. Enough." The guy just quickly nodded and exhaled in… relief? Exhaustion? Zamasu couldn't tell.

"I was just kinda in a hurry…" Ethan, the said man, chuckled nervously. "I have to be at the airport within uhh…" He frowned, realizing that he kinda lost track of how much time he had spent traveling without hit car. He dropped his suitcase and reached into his pocket, but was clumsily fumbling while he did so. Zamasu just stood there, this man was clumsier than how Zamasu used to be when he was _young_ -young.

"Where do you have to go?" The Kaioshin frowned.

"..To the airport." Ethan stopped, and quietly responded with a furrow of his brow, and Zamasu rolled his eyes.

"Okay, _I get that_. But _where_ from the airport?"

"Oh." Another nervous chuckle. "I have to be at Rose Corp for a job interview tomorrow-er, two days from now. It's in South City, and it's like a three hour drive away so umm, my only choice is by plane at the moment." _Rose Corp?_ Ethan was still trying to get his phone, but his portfolio was getting in the way of that. Zamasu blinked like three times before he reached out to grab the portfolio, slightly annoyed at how unpunctual this man's coordination was.

"Uhh… Thanks." He smiled, finally brandishing his phone from his now sticking-out pocket, tapping the screen just to see that it is now- "2:25 AM!?" Ethan blinked in utter shock, and Zamasu frowned.

"Is that a bad thing?" The Kaioshin didn't know how job appointments worked.

"My flight is supposed to leave in 20 minutes!" Ethan got really panicky now. "And the airport is more than an hour from here by foot."

"Umm…" Zamasu shrugged his arms in a belabored timbre. "Shouldn't you call one of those transportations you humans call taxi's?"

"The nearest taxi station isn't available right now, since they're expedited. I can't _wait_ for a taxi right now."

"Oh." That was all Zamasu had to say. And then he came up with a rather thoughtful idea. "I'll fly you to the airport then."

Ethan was in a panic, but the male paused to register that statement. "... _Huh?_ " He frowned heavily. "What do you mean fly? You have no wings."

Zamasu sighed. He didn't expect this human to know a thing about flying anyway. Zamasu was still holding his things when he started levitating about three feet above Ethan, who pretty much backed away in stupor.

"Yes I can." His blatant reply contrast with the comically confused look of the younger man. Zamasu lowered himself back down, and handed Ethan's things back. "If you need to go there, I can take you there within a minute or less." In truth, he could just teleport there, but Zamasu didn't really recall the exact appearance of the outside of the airport and he didn't want to teleport into a store with this man. He's much more classier than that.

Ethan blinked a few times again, and Zamasu gave him a look before turning around, seeing that his offer was turned down. "Alright then."

Within a couple of seconds after Zamasu turned around, Ethan spoke again. "Wait!" He looked much more desperate at the moment. "Please fly me there. I don't wanna be late, it's already early in the morning."

Zamasu blinked. "Alright. Umm…" This also meant he had to _hold_ this guy the whole time. "Grab on… to me, uhh…"

Zamasu could have said 'hold on to me', but there was this was this particular movie he saw and due to that, apparently that statement had a romantic connotation to the Kaioshin. Ethan blinked. "Uhh, okay then..."

"Can't you just put that folder in your suitcase?" Zamasu pointed to-and-fro the portfolio and the suitcase. Ethan quickly took that suggestion, opening his suitcase and placing the portfolio in there carefully (and clumsily, you get the gist). The younger man stood again, and went to Zamasu. Ethan didn't know… how this flying thing worked; did he have to hug this guy the whole time or something?

This was probably the most awkward thing Zamasu has ever done in his long life, because of how unsure Ethan was in his grasp. The Kaioshin had his arm secured around Ethan while Ethan's arm was against his shoulders. Zamasu grabbed the suitcase because he felt like this frightful human male would drop it mid flight, and slowly ascended until they both could see the layout of the street. Ethan blinked a few times, and started looking around when he realized that they were going much higher than he had anticipated.

"Uhh… wait, why are we hundreds of feet above the ground?"

"It's faster." And also, more appealing to Zamasu's eyes, because at least he can see the outline of the city as they flew. "You're not afraid of heights, are you?"

"Well umm, not really..." Ethan shook his head, suddenly grabbing Zamasu a little too hard because he was _starting_ to fear actually losing his grip. The speed they were going wasn't as fast as Zamasu would opt it to be because he had a human in his arms, and Ethan's head might come off or something. _So fragile_.

"Can you _not_ hold on to me like that?" Zamasu looked down at the tight grip of his chest, and Ethan's hair swayed in the wind.

"What?" He couldn't hear the Kaioshin because of the wind as they flew, and Zamasu shook his head and pulled Ethan's hand from his chest. This made the man fret and wrap his arms around Zamasu. "W-we're really high up, please don't make me lose my grip."

" _I'm_ the one holding on to you, you twit." Zamasu scowled. Ethan looked at him only to cower down and look away. Zamasu sighed and shook his head. "This isn't a long trip. Don't be so frightful."

It only took a good forty five seconds to get there anyway. Zamasu noticed the contrast between the area he was in, and the airport at the moment. There were quite a number of people commuting here despite it being so late, but it wasn't as much as it usually is during the day. He descended slow enough so that the slightly shaking man in his arms didn't turn into a pile of scaredy sludge. Zamasu released him, gave him his suitcase, and crossed his arms. "There."

Ethan looked like he had just front flipped into a portal. He looked around, because through the majority of this flight he had his eyes closed, and then back at the green dude in front of him. "T-thank you so much." He nervously chuckled, and reached out to give Zamasu a hand shake.

Zamasu looked down at his hand, and then back at him. "Just go catch your flight."

Ethan paused, but he nodded quickly and bid him a quick farewell before pulling out his phone to check the time again. The man passed Zamasu and entered the airport, and the Kaioshin turned around to see him walk in hastily before shaking his head. Of all the people he met so far, this man had to be the quintessential human with all of their stupid defense barriers; fearful, frightful, easily perturbed, subservient… you know, everything that screams an easy target of manipulation.

Unknown to Zamasu, the Kaioshin had saved Ethan's potential career by flying him out to the airport on his own behalf.

He turned around, and teleported himself back to Rebecca's house, rather than just flying there this time. Zamasu ended up in her living room, which was quiet and empty as everyone in the house was sleeping. He slowly traveled upstairs to look into the dog's rooms. Ollie was sound asleep in his light green bedding, the pug looked huggable in this vulnerable state. Zamasu looked down at the ground, and then closed the door and went to Loki's room. Loki was lightly snoring, since his snout was slightly covered by his blue pillow, and he was curled up in a fetal position which made him look more vulnerable than Ollie did. Zamasu looked to a wall in the room, and then he closed the door. The Kaioshin knew that Rebecca had to work tomorrow, so they couldn't train until about a few days from now.

He slowly opened her door, seeing the woman in an oversized shirt and sleep boxers. Her blanket wasn't on her person and her scrunched up body position indicated that she was cold, because the room was well-conditioned. Zamasu stepped in, went over to her bed, and picked up her blanket. He placed it over her body, and then he pitifully shook his head. Once again, here is the doctor forgetting about her own personal needs. _Once again_.

He left her room, and went back to his room. Luckily, he'll admit it, Ethan running into him was a great savior from the irritation he had felt. Despite it being a rather _wimpy_ distraction, it still took his mind from it nonetheless. Now, Zamasu felt no need to dwell on the thought anymore, so he sat down and took a book from the pile he made in his room out of Rebecca's collection deciding he'll spend his night reading. He did vow on one thing, though… and that was _never_ to come into contact with June again.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 _ **Endmite**_ **was actually based off of a long time story that I had in my head before I scrapped it out. It's basically the same as how it was stated in the fanfic with minor differences, and I never wrote the story out.**

 **Hmm…**

 **Anyways, I'd like to know what you guys thought about this chapter!**


	27. We Need To Talk

**Get ready for a history lesson, Bois and Girrs.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **We Need To Talk**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

"So you're gonna invite me, Adrian, and who else?" Jay looked downwards at his phone for a moment before looking back at the basketball player, who was in the middle of explaining his plans.

"We're gonna fly out, all six of us; me, you, Adrian, Shona, Mace, and maybe Zachary." James listed the people with his fingers. "The flight itself is like what, eight hours or something? Caplax is not that far."

Caplax is another country in the planet. It is basically the country where most of the popular sports events originated, basketball being one of them of course. Usually the GBF (Global Basketball Finals) takes place in different places around the world; this time it was in the heart of Caplax. Compared to Tycho, most of the country was urbanized like the West, but some parts were villages and hamlets and weren't impoverished either. Don't get it twisted, poverty is actually a minority thing in this planet, and that is on a _global_ scale.

"I did call Zachary yesterday." Adrian was sitting next to his housemate, who had his legs rested against Adrian's lap. They do this all the time. "He said it's been dry the past couple of days, so he wouldn't mind coming along."

"Is five too much?" Jay looked at James.

"Bro, I'm actually _playing_ in the finals. And besides, last time I checked which was like _thirty seconds ago_ ," he had the webpage up in another window on his phone, "There were still 12 seats available to place a reservation. You all are sitting _front row_."

"Front row?!" Adrian exclaimed. "Do you know how much that co- _wait…"_

" _Exactly._ " James laughed. The three of them had a bad habit of saying that things they couldn't afford before they got rich are expensive. It's a funny habit, to be honest. "So I got you, I got Jay, Mace and all of them…"

"...Is there room for another?" Adrian was looking at his phone.

James raised a brow at him. "Hmm?"

"I just started talking to Zamasu on here." Adrian was typing away, "And I kinda wanna take that idea of inviting him too."

James shrugged. "Okay, ask him. I don't mind it, does he even watch basketball?"

"I highly doubt it." Adrian shook his head. "But I still want him to come anyway. I just have a feeling he needs to join us."

"Why, so he can see the stupidity we get into?" Jay smirked. "I haven't spoke to him in a minute, tell him I said hi."

A pause, before Adrian spoke again. "He says 'hello'. I'ma ask him- you know what, lemme call this dude." Adrian pressed the little phone button, before putting it on speaker. There was a momentary pause before Zamasu's voice was heard.

"...Hello?"

"Yo, Zamasu, what's good." Adrian smiled.

"Why did you call me? We were messaging just now."

Jay chuckled, _messaging_. Adrian sort of snorted. "Well, you see, James has this big game that he's playing in, and he's invited me, Jay, and a few others. We just wanna know if you'd join in- oh, it's also outside of the country."

"I don't think think that's a problem for him though." Jay shrugged. "Mace will be there too, by the way."

"He will?" Zamasu asked.

"How does he know Mace?" Adrian frowned.

"He was with us a few days ago." Jay said, before Zamasu inquired again.

"Why would you want me to join you?"

"Because umm _first class jet,_ and we get to stay in an amazing hotel in a lit city, and there's free room service." Adrian belaboured.

Zamasu knew what a jet was, from what Chandler pointed out to him. But he can take a guess as to what would be in a first class jet. "How long is this trip?"

"I think it's a week." Adrian looked at James, who nodded in confirmation. "Yep, a week. James and his team had practiced in West City, and they will be having that game two days before we return."

"Don't you humans take a long time to recover from, what is it, jetlag?" Zamasu asked this, he didn't understand how they could just fly somewhere and be perfectly fine to spend a week in another country without major headaches.

"Bruh, we're celebrities. We'll be _fine_." Adrian reassured him. "You might wanna talk with Rebecca over this if you accept it, I know she's not some supervisor of yours, but still… please do so."

Zamasu gave it a little bit of thought. He knew what room service was from movies, and that meant free _copious_ amounts of delicious food. He may be a fatass for _possibly_ accepting this offer just because of that, and also because the idea of going to another country suddenly sounds interesting to him especially after spending a few minutes in Lexi's hotel room; the decor looked so _different_ from the houses he's been in so far in Tycho. His hunger to see more and more things won't be quenched anytime soon.

In fact, it never will be.

"I'll go."

Adrian blinked. He didn't expect Zamasu to straight up _accept_ the offer that quickly. "Oh shit, really?"

"Yes." Zamasu shrugged. "Only for the food."

" _Riiiight._ " Adrian smirked. He was getting the feeling that Zamasu somewhat liked their company, hell, it explains why they ended up doing stupid stuff and _still_ remained cool with one another. But he didn't know, he just thought that Zamasu should come along.

"Welp, his name is going there too." James went back to the reservation webpage.

"I'll send you a thing over text telling you when you need to be here so we can all go to the airport." Adrian looked over at James who told him that it would be near two days from now. "Wait, it's _that_ soon?"

"I told you it'd be the night after, genius." James shook his head. "So that makes seven of us. Check."

"Fine then." Zamasu nodded. They exchanged farewells before hanging up, and Zamasu looked up at the living room ceiling. He was back in Rebecca's house, and he just fed his canine children a few minutes before he received that call.

The Kaioshin looked down at his phone. Feeling like he wanted to explore a little bit, he tapped this weird magnifying glass button to pull up a search query. He didn't know what it was, and he didn't know why it pulled up his keyboard, but he decided to type something… Random, since his keyboard was being prompted. What if he typed in… the geography of this planet? That's what he did, and instantly a bunch of sites showed up within the search engine talking about the amount of countries this planet have, what was in them, and all kinds of things.

Zamasu didn't know how any of this stuff worked, so his curious ass went to the first site that was brandished from the search. He was met with many sources of information, as well as the planet's full geography.

This planet had five inhabited countries; Tycho, Caplax, Efilia, Anasa, Mandala these four being the most inhabited even up to modern times. He's seen three quarters of Tycho already minus South City, and he's been in a hotel at Efilia. As far as he knew, every single country had various different languages, but there is a universal language that everyone speaks for the sake of easier communication. (In this planet, the countries span as big as continents, and the cities are as big as countries) He found out that Tycho's South City was the most technologically advanced city in the world, followed by Mandala's Himura, and Efilia's Lyn. Caplax was like East City when it came to technology, except it wasn't as suburban as the East.

There was one particular country that wasn't inhabited, and little detail has been given on behalf of that country. The name of it was Draco, and that country itself was barely habited by anyone. The people who live there only live near the coastlines, not in the middle or anywhere else on Draco, and the population is somewhere around 200. This same country was also the same place where a lot of testing and projects for _machinery and tech_ was taking place, so it was basically the biggest construction site you could find. Not many people fly there, and rather they don't because there is no reason to.

He read on behalf of more about the population in the planet. For some reason, he expected it to be in the tens of _billions_ when it was actually only about 5 billion people living right now. He had a feeling that it was way more than that, but that would be a question he'll ask this rectangle right after.

He hit the back arrow button taking him out of that site and letting him see the other search queries. He typed in a question regarding the population and instantly got the exact number as the first query;

4,003,478,007

Only _four billion_ people live in this _giant_ planet. Zamasu has flown around Tycho, and he could say that country _alone_ was huge enough to supplant more than 3 billion people. The next table query showed the populations for the four countries with Efilia having the highest, and Anasa having the lowest. He scrolled down and saw a particular title that called to his attention loudly;

 _A War's Long-Lasted Effects: Seventy Years After The Global Massacre_

He frowned… there was a _war_? Only seventy years ago? He instantly clicked on it, and read over the article quickly.

 _The years before 5349.73 marked the rising hostility between the world powers. As a result of the purge, a vast population was killed over the course of a thousand years, and we now see a drought in our humanity that the world has never seen before._

 _The war went on for seven years. In those seven years, billions of people were killed as a result of corporate integration of all livelihoods, leaving many houses, families, and the planet's terrain in destruction._

Zamasu was shocked. This was occurred exactly 78 years ago, the year as of now is 5350.51. The world he was seeing right now looked like there hadn't even been any conflict for _hundreds_ of years, and now he learns that there was a war, which wiped out billions of people. But how many?

 _The world population decreased faster than we could realize. A homely size of 12.3 billion, dropped along the crossfires like flies in a mere seven years. Many of the corporations themselves crumbled under the anger of the masses, who realized too late that the war needed to be thwarted. Tycho, Mandala, Draco… These three countries were nearly decimated by the nuclear and mechanical warfare caused by our own people._

That made his eye twitch. How disgusting… once again, he finds a bigger reason to hate the way humans are. The people he was with weren't even twice as old as the timeframe of this devastating era. That made him think, since this war happened seventy years ago, the parents of the people he met or maybe their grandparents, were there to experience this horrid bloodshed. He kept reading.

 _The world has shown massive improvement as a result of the 'new corps' emerging, with most of many governments suddenly erased from the world, causing mass tyranny and anarchist groupings to rise for almost half a century following the war. This is the result of all controlling governments losing all of their power within the blink of an eye._

 _Most of Draco became uninhabitable from all the dense radiation, and birthed the infamous 'Draco Craters'. These craters are steep enough to drop over hundreds of feet below sea level within the middle portion of the entire country. The ground is a combination of rock, molten metal, and human remains, a long lasting reminder of the war's marks on our world. Because of this, any of the inhabitants that were still living in Draco evacuated immediately, rendering it a ghost country even seven decades after the war._

So _that's_ why Draco is barely inhabited, Zamasu shook his head. Even reading the amount of destruction this caused made him angry, and sick to his gut. It was getting on behalf of Tycho, and this one he wanted to read because he didn't know how this country managed to pick themselves up in such a short amount of time.

 _The very northern forest of Tycho (Insula) was the main area stricken with fires and tanks, while the middle of Tycho received airstrikes, mostly on what is now known as East City, while the North was another concurrent war ground. Efforts have been pushed to keep those two cities as habitable as possible; it is one of the reasons as to why these two cities of Tycho are the most environmentally efficient, with EPIs over R10._

EPI stood for Environmental Performance Index, and the scale went up to 100. R10 is anything between 90 and 100, as Zamasu had read on the side note.

 _The West and South Cities were purged during the war, but shown immense succession through the rise of technology. South City was where the 'Tech Renaissance' began, the smaller governments were assembled together and started working in bipartisan to push the education of technology for the future generation._

 _Amidst the anarchy and rising frustration due to the lack of government-_

And this where Zamasu shook his head. Humans are so dependent…

 _There were worldwide inspirations that helped to bring their locals together; the resurgence of art and music, and the quick shift to technological advancement following the Renaissance. It did not take mere months for this to fully impact the world, this took many years._

 _Skip ahead fifty years after the war, there was an emergence in the new ideas being spread about to keep our technology up to par. In fact, the world hasn't been_ _ **this**_ _better off ever since the start of the Industrial Era which was four centuries ago. It's quite an interesting thought to have, that a single devastating event could have such long lasting effects on the world… Only to improve it in the end._

The article posed quite a realization in the Kaioshin, that mass suffering was literally the _only_ way for such a large population to realize that things _must_ change. He would have _never_ thought that such unsafe environments existed twenty years ago, which was just about when Adrian, Jay, James-pretty much all of the people he met so far, were mere children. And simultaneously, the world was being rebuilt under all the mysteriousness of the previous government, allowing the public to better access the same knowledge that kept many people around the world impoverished. He went back and looked at several other articles, all of this information was _profound_. This horrible war that killed more than _five billion_ people lasted for _seven_ years, and it took the entire world seventy plus years to refurbish themselves, to get to where they are now.

They improved quite well, to be fair. He's seen pictures of certain places in the world, and they looked malnourished prior to the war itself. These same places are now green and tech-savvy, mostly inhabited by people.

There was another thing he found out that was technically brought up in the other article he read about the war; every country was named something different prior to the war, or _global massacre_ as what he found was the more popular term. Tycho was not named Tycho, it was Kiliken, and it was an ethnocentric country. Back then, all Kilikians were light skinned with mostly brown eyes, like Lexi, but now Tycho is a more diverse country with less Kilikian conglomerates and more people of foreign descent, and this was due to the war itself. Mandala was another, it was called Himura but that name became its capital city and Mandala was the new name for the country. At first he didn't understand why _this_ had occurred, but the he realized that the weight of not having a government and 'safety' probably led people to believing that spoons were forks, and that the neighbors next to them were not their neighbors at _all_.

That's how damaging the war was.

Draco wasn't Draco, it had a more techno name to it; IL-85309. He guessed that it was because this is the location where most of the constructions of machines and weapons took place so they probably didn't need to give it a fancy name. However, the need to hide that country was consigned; almost all of the tech that's been out for the past half of a decade was due to mathematicians and scientist rising up in the ranks of society because they simply knew how the world would cooperate better. Because of the fact that there was barely any government, they didn't need to worry about soliciting confidential information, nor did they have to worry about mysterious people knocking on their door or disappearing from the face of the planet 'mysteriously'.

This planet's history was _no joke_.

From what he could gather on the sapient population, humans make up 96% of their population, while 3% were super-AI, and the other 1% were otherworldly beings who come and go as they please. The five billion includes these three subspecies of beings, and animals outnumber that population obviously. Zamasu is in the .000000001% or way less than that, because he's the only God on this planet.

 _Heh._

He could ask another human about all this information, but then he recalled he had met and learned about a certain AI who used to be a part of the government, according to Mace. Who better to ask than a talking _library_ of historical information? The Kaioshin would go and inquire on this a bit, but first, he had some _proving_ to do. He smirked while looking down at his phone, fingers glazing against his now opened contacts at the brown-grey eyed woman who so dared to challenge his godliness.

 _This will be fun_.

X¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤×¤x

"Listen… we need to talk."

Initially, Mark was bustling down the FPICA building with many compiled documents that he and his fellow detectors brandished from countless investigations done at certain crimes scenes over the course of the week. Once again, the same black van culprits were showing up, that's no surprise, and they were all doing more and more _petty_ crimes that would lead them into jail for only a short amount of time, which made no sense. Of course, they could just keep arresting these pests until they all are gone, but even though the crimes weren't drastic, it seems like there is _more_ of them being done.

What he found was… sort of ambiguous, given the nature of these crime scenes, but he, Jones and Xavier agreed on one thing; These black vans were fall guys.

He didn't know what or why, but he felt like all these crimes being done were only done to distract him, the rest of the investigators, the policemen, deputies, and superintendents from a bigger problem. The investigations were increasing becoming more synonymous, as he started seeing this weird tag on pretty much all of the criminals, but these tags were all different. They were different colors, the rectangles would face different directions, and there were some with triangles around the rectangles, it confused him and his team greatly.

Right now, in the afternoon of a weekday, he stood in front of the superintendent of his specific investigation team, explaining all of this to the individual. Jones, Hubbs and Xavier were still doing extensive deconstructing of their findings, because they didn't go into this as much as he did. Maybe it's the effect of not sleeping for a night or two, maybe it isn't, but his gut was faintly telling him that this was starting to become a bigger problem than it should've been.

Little did he know, it's actually a _gigantic_ problem. In unimaginable heights by the time everyone figures this out.

"...And I can't seem to shake off the feeling that this may be a giant ploy of some sort. I know it's way too vague in terms of evidence, but I seriously think this might be true."

The superintendent looked over the documents, scanning and scrolling to the right to read more and more of these findings. He stood right in front of the tablet on the table while using his robotic hands to access the next page. Mark stood there, watching as the small AI in front of him looked over his documents while nodding occasionally.

Within about a minute, the AI slid the tablet a little further. His feet started to propel him upwards so that he was levitating at eye level with Mark, before crossing his arms and speaking with his usual squeaky pitched, authoritative voice. "Mr. Naner, you've produced enough studies to fully dissect this whole situation _atomically_ , I understand that. But how is all of this of any correlation between each and every black van crime that has been enacted?"

Mark was in front of none other than S.I Tenebrist Bee, one of the highest-tiered superintendents in the FPICA who works closely with the director himself. Bee is an AI, his frame is actually really small as to where he was barely even a foot tall, and the top of his head was a very dark blue hue while his face was akin to a black screen with two blue lines serving as his 'eyes'. He had a barrel-chest build, his torso being the same dark blue while his arms were white and a lighter shade of navy blue. His legs were bulky around the 'calve' area, being mostly white while his feet were navy blue. His name comes from the initial body he had while being in the war, and that body resembled a tenebrionid, also his color scheme is of dark blue colors hence his name.

"The tags themselves, they all have tags." Mark inadvertently pointed to his tablet as if that page was already open. "Every black van is made with the _same_ model as well."

"Those tags, from what I have read and seen from your account and many others, are all very different. Whether they have the same size or not is irrelevant, because they are varied in sizes, and do not have DNCs at all." _DNC_ 's were Detected Numerical Codes, used for most brand logos, businesses and organizations. "If they were of the same, or of any organization if you will, their DNC would _always_ be detectable, there is no other way around that. Vans can have the same model, however many of these black vans variate in their own models whether they be old or new. These crimes have spanned out across almost every city in Tycho, and so far we haven't found a single hideout of theirs in any location."

Mark almost was defeated, because he knew this wouldn't be convincing at all since such a thing would be a stretch to say with such research. These guys weren't doing giant crimes either, so it would be hard to _pinpoint_ their direct focus. And then he remembered. "You've seen the extra compilation I have in there, did you?"

"Which one?" Bee looked down at the tablet before descending to the table. "I didn't see an extra document." Mark backed out of the opened document before tapping another. This one contained finding on behalf of the black box that Rebecca was sent, along with her poisoning and the papers found within. It also contained the investigation done in South City, where Terry was targeted. "Some of them are targeting specific people?"

"Yes." He nodded. "I wish I could get a more concrete base on Terry's situation, but Rebecca's was as clear as day. They were after her."

The AI looked up at him. "How long has this been happening?"

"That's the only case I could get. The only feasible case where they did _something_."

"The _only_ one?"

"...Yes." Mark blinked and looked downwards for a moment before Bee spoke up again.

"Don't get all sullied, I see that this has happened more than two weeks ago. This is fairly recent, so I can send a few guys to her home to ask more questions on behalf of this situation." Bee looked carefully at Mark, his blue lined eyes angled upwards. "I know you are getting just as fed up as I am."

"How do you know?" Mark frowned.

"You look like you haven't slept in two days."

Mark looked down at his disheveled outfit, and he knew that his hair was also a ruffled mess. "Fair enough."

Bee nodded. "Yup." He articulated, raising both his hands. "Look, I could definitely go with your hypothesis, I really could. But right now, we're tied between having to actually arrest these men and investigate these situations further. If we focus on trying to connect the dots too much, many of these black vans could go under the radar. You must understand that we're weighing the factor of crimes rates more than anything." Bee slid the tablet back over to him with his tiny feet. "Do not discard any of that, though. I know where you're coming from, but right now we can't jump the gun on behalf of this. All of these crime surges happened in a matter of two months, it is way too quick to consider such an idea." He raised both of his hands. "Keep this information and wait it out." Right at that moment, another AI walked in swiftly. He opened Bee's office door and closed it, walking right to where Mark was standing. The AI didn't greet him or Mark at first.

Bee paused, and tilted his head. "So you're just not gonna greet or anything, Rogue?"

Rogue was a post-military AI who, like Bee, was a part of the war. His body was all black with red undertone tendons that were purposely exposed. His chest was broad, with the same red undertones that barely glowed in the daylit room. His head was an odd shape, an elongated cranium with a screen-like face that had a rectangle centered in it, running to where below his 'eyes' should end. Unlike Bee, this robot stood just as tall as Mark did, maybe even an inch taller, and he was _just as sarcastic_ as Bee himself.

"Oh, right." Rogue had a male human-esque voice, as he turned to Mark only. "Hello there."

See?

Bee crossed his arms. "What is it, Red?"

Rogue looked back at him. "The investigations, all documents have been compiled and I have read the many findings just several minutes ago." He crossed his arms. "I dunno about you, but I'm finding things that are starting to add up. Nobody seemed to address the similarities in all of these crime scenes."

Mark could have given Rogue the swiftest dap he could. Bee nodded immediately. "This guy did." Bee pointed to Mark and Rogue looked at him.

Mark nodded. "My research concluded that many of these vans happen to have tags- _different_ tags of course, as well as their constant doing of petty crimes. I went into detail with Bee just now, and I told him that I think these guys are connected, and are only a part of a bigger scheme."

"They are connected, yes. But with them being possible pawns sounds _way_ too farfetched for me. There is way too many of them being put in jail, and way too many of them being acquitted." Bee looked at the two. "I'm not _not_ considering it, though."

"You guys noticed that there is a specific timeframe between these crimes?" Rogue pointed out. "My team has come up with the reasoning that all these crimes never take place during the evening, and they all happen to be well coordinated whenever they do bigger scale crimes. Matter of fact, even the smallest things like robbing a _deli_ store are delicate pieces of information that I can't let slide. They almost _always_ occur between 11 and 2 PM and anywhere after 7 to 3 AM."

"They did rob a jewelry store, and staged it as a shootout near a gas station." Mark said. "It was on the news, but at the time no one knew they'd heist the jewelry store."

"I've seen that, and all we can do is continue to arrest them. Investigations will be pushed further, I've already told Mace that this may or may not be a bigger problem. At this rate, we wouldn't know." Rogue shrugged.

"It'll take _time_." Bee added. "It's way too early to assess any of that." And he was right. Mark nodded, looking down at his documents on his tablet. He gave his biddings to Bee and Rogue before leaving the two superintendents to speak with one another. The detective called up Terry again, asking how he was doing and immediately insisting that he'd visit the hospital and stay with the gynecologist before he would embark on more inner workings. He spoke with a few other detectives, investigators, and other forensics before leaving the FPICA department and heading to . He entered and asked where Terry was, walking through the huge hallways and to the elevator to reach the fifth floor. He walked into the room to see his friend laying on the hospital bed, all bandaged and semi-smiling at Mark's presence.

"I got something to tell you," Mark took a sat and sat next to Terry's bed. "Those guys who jumped you early in the morning have been arrested."

"Really?" Terry blinked. "Wow… you guys came about quick. Wait… how did the cops manage to catch them?"

"Well, it was like 2:10 when we got a call from Shona himself saying that there were four giant guys beating someone in the middle of the night. They were found running away in the same street that the police cars had arrived in." Mark looked down at his phone for a moment, and Terry nodded slowly. Well, he sort of nodded, his neck kind of ached at the moment so any drastic moment would made the 39 year old man cry.

"That brings up another question." Mark was smirking, and Terry already knew that he'll have to brandish the same explanation once again. "How the hell did you end up _running_ into Shona in the first place?"

"He was driving in that area, and he just saw what was going on." Terry said. "He started beating the men up before they ran away, and he took me to the hospital right after."

"Ohhh, that's sweet of him." Mark smiled; he didn't think a multimillionaire martial artist actor would do such a thing, not that he had any bad opinions of Shona either. But he knew how much Terry loved the movies Shona was in, and decided to be a jerk. "Did you ask for his number?"

"Shut up." If Terry could, he would punch Mark's arm but all he did was this half-assed lazy arm swing, because both his arms weren't in no condition to playfully punch someone. The gynecologist smiled. "How's work been though?"

"It's been… hefty. We're working as a large team on these black van crimes, because there is so many of them happening at once." Mark shook his head. "I even told Bee and Rogue about what happened to you and Rebecca. We're still conducting more investigations on behalf of this. Speaking of which, where is she?"

"I don't know." Terry bared a shrug. "I think she's either at a break or out today."

The detective blinked. "Wait… has she not visited you yet?"

"...No." Terry didn't realize that of the recent hours he spent awake, Rebecca had not entered his room once. He told her that he was in need to of medical attention and cannot work today, and he even gave her his room number as well. Not once did he see her enter, or walk by the hallways when the door was open. "Maybe she's busy."

Mark looked elsewhere with the frown still on his face. "I guess…" Maybe it was the effect of him not getting enough sleep over all of this, and overanalyzing things by accident which is what you do when you haven't got much shuteye. Why would she _not_ visit him, even if she were busy? They were in the same hospital, it wasn't like a drive away or something, she could have at least said _hi_. Perhaps even ask if he was okay- "Did she at least text you, asking if you were okay?"

"I told her about my condition before she got the chance of ask, but she say she hoped I get better soon via text."

Mark knew the amount of worry Terry had for the younger doctor. He would always ask if she was alright, and she would always say yes. The man cared a lot about her well being, Mark can see that. And to see that she didn't even spare a passing glance at him was giving him very _left_ vibes on behalf of this woman. Even though he had only met her the last time she went to the police department, Terry would sometimes talk extensively about her safety, and Mark liked that he cared about her a lot. Right now, he was starting to not like it and it had nothing to do with Terry's genuineness; it had _everything_ to do with the way this woman was acting.

& _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_ & _8_

Nousha threw another dart at the board across the living room. She was sitting on her extendable sofas lounging with several darts chilling right beside her. The dartboard itself was posted on the interior column in front of the kitchen, it was specialized for sharp _throwers_ , or those who had exceptional aim. She scored at least five single bullseyes and two doubles before she had completely finished, going upstairs to at least put on some clothes.

She received a text message out of nowhere, it didn't make her jump because her phone was on vibrate and she felt it prior. The expert gunslinger took her phone from the side table and into her hands, and blinked at the message she had received.

 **Human.**

She could _feel_ who this was already. She sent him a text.

NuNoushiee: **Hello… God.**

What are the odds of getting to say that? She decided to add his number, and when she saw his username she full on laughed. Guy has quite a dry sense of humor.

God: **I'm going to your house.**

NuNoushiee: **You remember what my door looks like? X3**

God: **Why wouldn't I?**

NuNoushiee: **Have you even left your uhh… home or something?**

God: **I haven't.**

She shook her head. He's probably playing with her, she could tell. Nousha smirked.

NuNoushiee: **Well, I'll be waiting. Patiently.**

She stood up to go and put on something to wear. Going through her downstairs corridor, she went to her stairs just in time to pass by another individual who was concurrently going down.

"Can you at least wear pants or something?" Her brother frowned at her. To be fair, Nousha literally had nothing but a robe on, she was all naked underneath. Her brother came to visit and had been staying over in the place for the past three days because why not, and she's not the one to change up her 'house etiquette' over someone who's grown up with her almost half her life. She stopped momentarily to look at the man who touched base with the hallway's floor.

Brown-grey eyes looked at her brother's with a frown. "What does it _look_ like I'm boutta do?"

His British-like accent cut through the mostly silent house. "I don't know, just do it."

 _Geez_ , she went upstairs and into her room, leaving her silent phone downstairs as she did so.

Zamasu approached a brown door, horizontal silver stripes ran across the wood-like color of the house's entrance. What he was standing in front of was a modern looking contemporary, mostly of different shades of brown. Like the proper being he is, he rang the doorbell and clasped his hands behind his back. He knew this was Nousha's home somehow, because as once he landed he instantly felt the faint and familiar energy. For some reason, it was a bit stronger than before, but as he approached her door, the feeling started to fade. Being right in front of her door, he could barely detect any of that weird energy that he sensed earlier. It took several seconds before the door finally opened and...Zamasu ended up being eye-to-eye with someone he'd never seen before.

Actually no, he _did_ see this individual before, on Nousha's silly profile picture, but he looked a little different. His man have _grey irises_ , just like Zamasu except the man had pupils of course. His pupils and Nousha's looked _extremely contracted_ , not unhealthily though, like if you were standing farther away you'd probably think they wouldn't have them at all. His hair was that rose pick color, but it was in a messy mid bun, and his bangs caressed his also pink eyebrows. The man had the same skin tone as Nousha, and was lean yet barrel chested. He had a small waist, but a firm build underneath his black baggy sweater and black joggers.

"Umm… hello there…" The man raised a brow as he somewhat greeted the Kaioshin. Zamasu blinked; why did this man sound so… elegant? Something about his voice and the way he speaks was an aesthetic, not to mention his hair was Zamasu's possibly favorite color. Zamasu didn't like to pick favorites, but rose pink looks… beautiful.

"Hello." Zamasu gave him a firm greeting.

The guy frowned, grey eyes narrowed. "Are we in some of trouble, or something?"

"No," Zamasu shook his head, "I'm looking for Nousha."

" _Oh?_ " The man nodded. "Well, she's upstairs. Hold on… HEY!" The man sassily turned around to the stairs, not bothering to say her name at all and she responded with an equally sassy 'What'. He turned around and looked at Zamasu, beckoning him forward. "Come in, make yourself comfortable."

The Kaioshin didn't expect to meet this pink-haired man at all, and he didn't expect to actually enter Nousha's house. Her living room was spacious, the placement of her furniture was meant for comfort, making it very hard for anyone to just walk in and _not_ recline against her couch nonchalantly. The entire living room setting was warm; the ceiling and floor were champagne colored, her furniture complimented such light color with beige, and the wall decor supplemented darker hues to better balance the colors in the room. It would seem like this placement was carefully planned, every single piece within this premise was considered. He'll give her that one, she knew her furniture placement quite well.

"What is this?" Zamasu pointed to the dartboard one of the interior walls.

The man turned around. "Oh, that's just her dartboard. She gets bored, and throws darts on it. It's just her thing." He strolled into the kitchen, and Zamasu watched the gait of this man. It was very posh, not snobby posh but had a nice elegant feel to it. "Would you like something to drink?"

Zamasu weighed the statement for a moment. He wasn't thirsty, but he was tempted to know what was in this woman's pantry. "Not at all." The Kaioshin turned around and was about to sit on her couch before a pleasant scent hit his nose. It was the same scent of the black tea that he had in the bakery, except more profound. He stood up, following the scent into the kitchen, and seeing the pink haired man fixing himself a cup of tea.

"Is that black tea?" Zamasu looked down at the black iron kettle on the electric stove, and then his eyes traveled to the jar of herbs the man was using. They were _pure black tea herbs_ , uncovered from the fancy lid for its glass jar.

"Yup." The man nodded with a smile. "I can't go a day without drinking tea. It becomes a lifestyle."

"Indeed it is..." Zamasu nodded slowly in agreement while stepping closer to the man, he was getting quite interested. He watched as the male aerated the water, bringing it to a near full boil, and finally putting all of his herbs within a small mesh ball that had a chain running out of it and placing it into his cup. He then took the kettle a poured it slowly, with no rush or impatience. Zamasu had never seen anyone (besides himself) finesse making a cup of tea, and it was almost refreshing to see that someone else takes consideration into their tea making. "I've only had black tea once. It has quite an interesting flavor."

"Oh absolutely." The man looked at him. "Nousha doesn't really like black tea, she mostly drinks green tea on a daily basis and that's mainly because I'm here to make her tea for her."

"What, the woman doesn't know how to make her own cup?"

"No, she does." He shook his head and shrugged. "Mine just tastes better." He smirked. The aroma lightly filled the kitchen, and Zamasu realized that the leaves were actually much stronger than he thought. What he smelled before was only the leaves themselves, which is why this man allowed his water to heat up a bit longer than usual due to its strong flavor. He allowed the cup to sit on its own while he went to get some raw honey out of her cabinet. "I like a little bit of sweetness in my cup today, so don't judge me."

It's not _uncommon_ for tea drinkers to sweeten their tea. Zamasu doesn't do it to his cups, but he had never tried tea with honey before. "I'm not judging at all. I think you're doing an excellent job at making tea."

Grey eyes frowned at Zamasu, with a tiny smile on his face. "And you have the same level of _expertise_ as me to be saying that?"

"Actually, a lot _more._ " Zamasu approached the pink haired man. He wasn't sensing the energy at all. "But I'll be glad to taste your handiwork."

"Huh… alright, then." The man made another cup for Zamasu, and when he was swiftly finished, he leaned back against the countertop and started talking to Zamasu about tea. They literally went on about the types of tea they drink, their methods of making it, and all sorts of tea-a-boo things for a few minutes until their cups were fully infused. Zamasu took a light sip, taking note of the temperature and the flavor of said tea; it tasted different from the one he drank at the bakery, in fact, much _better_.

"This is an amazing cup." Zamasu looked down at it as if it was an artform. There was no murkiness in the water, it was clear as any innocent reflection. There was no draft, the water was perfectly aerated, and the temperature was right where it was supposed to be. This man in front of him had an amazing temperament, and was also just as earnest as the woman he was living with. He could tell this just from looking at how his tea was. "What is your name?"

This was the first time Zamasu actually wanted to know the name of a human individual. He saw a lot of himself in this man, oddly enough. But the man answered regardless. "My name is Naz. It's a shorter version of my real name, Shahnaz, I reckon you can use it. What's yours?"

"Zamasu." The Kaioshin placed his tea back down, and gave Naz a handshake. "Nice to meet you. You're an… interesting person, like your partner."

Naz blinked. "My what?"

"Your partner, Nousha, is she not?" Zamasu thought the two were affiliated romantically.

"Uhh, _no_." Naz looked generally weirded out by the question. "Nousha is my _sister_."

 _They're related?!_ Zamasu frowned, and then he realized that he probably should have taken half a step back to acknowledge their facial features; Naz did somewhat resemble Nousha, but faintly. What remained the same was the grey tint of their eyes, while Nousha's was partial, Naz had full-on grey eyes. Maybe it was the stark contrast of hair color that caught Zamasu's eye before everything else, or his distinct way of speaking even. "Oh… pardon me, then."

"It's fine." Naz dished it off with a wave, there was someone coming down the stairs. "People confuse us as a couple for some reason. We're used to it."

"Naz, where's the-" Nousha stopped when he noticed that her brother was speaking with the Kaioshin himself. She came down with a pair of brown joggers and a black crop top that showed her toned stomach. She also had a gadget-like belt around her hips. "Oh shit, hey Mr. God… I don't think you've told me your name before."

"Wait, _this_ is the guy you told me that healed your arm?" Naz pointed at Zamasu while looking at his sister who straight faced.

"What other green people do I know?" She raised her hand in a questioning gesture.

"I dunno, you meet a bunch of people of arcane ways. Thank you for that." Naz flashed Zamasu a smile at his ending statement. Why would he thank the Kaioshin for removing _her_ wounds? "And he's Zamasu, that's what he told me."

"You'd be correct." Zamasu validated his statement before turning to the woman before him. "Are you ready?"

Nousha raised two fingers. "Wait, okay you said you were a God of Creation? We could do this here then; why don't you create a umm… hmmm…" She thought about her choice, and while she did that, Zamasu looked her over patiently. "A bouquet of irises."

The Kaioshin was accessing her thoughts briefly when she said what she wanted. It was only a quick look-in, and he got the exact imagery that her mind was producing. In that moment, Naz's eyebrows moved slightly and Nousha's posture straightened inadvertently. The Kaioshin summoned a polished black vase with vibrant, blooming irises right in front of the two.

Nousha's eyes widened. "... It looks exactly like how I pictured it..." She didn't think he'd get a _direct_ visualization of what she wanted, but he did. Nousha looked at the Kaioshin.

"Yes, I can read minds." Zamasu crossed his arms, while Naz took the vase into his hands, seeing if it was tangible or not.

"It's an actual vase. I don't think any other species could do that so quickly." Naz placed the pottery on the lower interior wall next to picture frame. "So you're telepathic, and you can create objects. What's next?"

"He just disappeared."

"Wait, what?" Naz turned to his sister, who was somehow really calm about this showcase of powers. Not that she was bored, the woman was _impressed_ , but she always had a great composure. He looked around the kitchen, the both of them moved around before inadvertently turning to where Zamasu had ended up, which was in Nousha's living room _with_ his cup of tea.

"I'm surprised you two caught on to my location almost immediately." Zamasu smirked, as they slowly left the kitchen to approach him in the living room. He was sitting on her couch as he raised a finger towards one of the footrests, telekinetically bring it closer to where he was to rest his feet against it. "If I were to show you two more, I'm afraid I'd damage some things in your home."

Nousha blinked. She assessed the Kaioshin momentarily before speaking. "I might be little sold right here."

"Watch he pulls out some sort of purple energy sword right out his hand or some crazy shi-" Naz spoke a little too quickly. Zamasu was standing in front of the both of them with his purple God Split Cut calmly radiating out of his hand.

"Already have that."

"You know what, Mr. Magic Guy-"

"Use my name, human." He quickly corrected Nousha, raising and pointing a finger at her.

" _Zamasu_." She smirked. "I think I can roll with this. But I want you to do something else for me." Nousha walked over to where her car keys were, while Naz frowned and looked at the Kaioshin. They both shrugged at each other at the same time before she spoke. "We're gonna go out, to the Greenyard."

Ah, that place. Zamasu nodded. "And what do you plan on doing there?"

"You'll see." She smiled at him. "Naz, you wanna join?"

Her brother gave her a look. "You two can do your little things. I'm gonna be busy."

"Busy doing what?" Nousha narrowed her eyes.

" _Busy_ doing _things_. Goodbye- oh, and goodbye to you too, Zamasu." Naz gave them a wave, and then nodded at Nousha before turning around and going upstairs. Nousha smirked, and then looked at Zamasu, who semi-caught the action between the siblings. It looked so innocuous, that Zamasu dismissed it as them just… communicating as siblings. Nousha opened her door, and Zamasu shot a hand out to grab her wrist.

'You're standing in front of a God, and you decide to use a slow mode of transportation instead?"

Nousha blinked. "Are you gonna bridal-carry me to the Greenyard then?" She smirked, slowly closing her door while looking at him. "How else are we gonna get there?"

Prior to this afternoon, Zamasu spent all night looking at the locations of place sin Tycho. He found out that the large forest where the trillionaire lived was called Insula, and he found pictures on what the Greenyard looked like. He didn't speak, he just held her shoulder, and then looked ahead before they both were teleported into the open fields of the Greenyard.

Nousha blinked. "Well… that's one way…"

He chuckled. "Now what is it that you'd like to show me?"

Nousha placed both hands on her waist, right above her gadget belt. "I have six rounds in this belt that I'm wearing." She opened a satchel on both sides of her waist and pulling out a small firearm with only her fingers. She spun the two pistols in her hands, flipping the over her midback and up in the air before catching them, and using her fingers to click the safe off of the gun. "This could have been something else, but I wanted to have a bit of fun with this. I think you know how fast a bullet travels, right?"

Zamasu's curiosity increased. "I'm afraid I don't know that." Nor would it matter, he's a God.

"A handgun bullet travels at 800 miles per hour." She faced a pistol to the side of him, meant to miss Zamasu's forehead by several feet to his left. "I can move back if you like, but I wanna see just how fast you can react by stopping the bullet before it passes you."

Zamasu smirked; this woman had tricks up her sleeve. "Very well, then. Stay right there, and go ahead."

Nousha didn't need to ground her position. "Alright then. I'll count down to three and yo-"

"You don't need to do that." Zamasu clarified, And Nousha nodded with a growing smirk. He knew that he would have to factor in Nousha's quickdraw ability, but that wouldn't be a problem for someone who has his telekinetic abilities mastered. A bullet is tiny, at a fast velocity it would be easy for Zamasu to track its movement especially when they travel in a straight line. Without warning, Nousha fired a shot from one pistol in her right hand. The Kaioshin didn't need to slow down time in his mind's eye, all he did was raise a finger, and the fast traveling bullet stopped just a few feet in front of him to his left. He released it, allowing the bullet to fall to the floor.

Nousha suddenly fired two more shots from each pistol, switching from aiming several feet away from him to aiming directly _at_ him. Zamasu assessed the way her fast hands moved, already tracking where the bullets would be heading to before she pulled her triggers. Mind you, this process of hers took less than a second. His finger raised again, and all four bullets stopped at the same distance away from him, which was a bit farther than the first bullet. Zamasu found this to be entertaining, this served as a way to _benchmark_ his godly reflexes.

However, Nousha could tell of what he was doing. She knew he was watching the way her hands moved, albeit he was doing it too quickly. The gunslinger smiled at his methodical approach to all of this. "Have you seen a gun before you were in the Gunnery?"

"No." Once again, six bullets were levitating in front of him before they uselessly dropped to the ground. "How could you tell?"

"You're looking at all of this in a very methodized way." Nousha lowered her firearms. "You wouldn't need to track where my hands would be prior to me shooting if you had prior knowledge of guns, considering how fast your reflexes are. I see you're trying to get a _sight_ of how these babies work." She casually spun the guns with her fingers. "Not a bad thing on your part, it's something I just figured out."

Zamasu was impressed by the aptitude of the woman, how she was able to dissect what he was doing after shooting one full round at him. All of what they did didn't even last for a minute, thirty seconds even, as both parties were well-trained in their own right. The Kaioshin stood with his body to the side, and then Nousha asked him a random question.

"Can you give me some coins?"

Zamasu frowned. "Why?"

"I get hungry." She smiled.

"I'm certain that you can sustain yourself without my help, considering the house you live in." Zamasu shook his head. "Tsk, tsk. It's not right to ask for money from someone, Nousha."

"You can't at least help me? I only need a couple dozen coins, that's it."

He shrugged, and decided to heck with it anyway. Due to deflation, the world didn't need coins for any ones; they all range from 10 to 50 only. So he conjured 24 coins worth 10 each, and handed them to her.

"Thank you." She gave him a warm smile. He tilted his head; Nousha is really pretty. She placed the coins equally into one of her gadget pockets, right in front of where her pistols would be. "So, we'll continue."

"This isn't hard to do, woman." Zamasu crossed his arms. "But I find it interesting."

"Right, I see…" Nousha placed both pistol back in their satchels. Her hands made such a swift movement that Zamasu didn't even catch it. She threw up a coin from each hand, and then draw clocked both pistols to hit and ricochet off the coins' surfaces. Zamasu didn't catch this immediately, the direction of the bullet change slowed the bullets down slightly, but they ended up being aimed at his chest rather than to the sides of him. He stopped them again, this time they were several _inches_ away from making contact with him. Nousha did it again, except she flipped the coins using her ring fingers, slightly angling her hands to make the coins fly towards one another. She threw the first two much higher while the second two were lower, and she quickly draw clocked at both coins so that the higher ones aimed at his shoulders and the lower ones aimed at his abdomen. Zamasu was able to stop all four of them, only _barely_ because she was much more abrupt with her movements and because the trajectory of the bullets changed rapidly. They were closer to hitting him than the last two.

He had a feeling that Nousha was secretly a genius. She timed her coin flips well enough to make the higher ones aim directly at his shoulders. Not only that, she aimed from the outer surfaces of both coins, which seems harder to do and much harder to exact a perfect aim like she did. She even switched up the finger she would use to flick, her pointer finger made the coins fly vertically while her ring finger angled the flight of the coins. This husky-voiced woman continued to shoot, and Zamasu found himself having to take steps back because she was moving a lot faster suddenly.

Her second rounds were finished, and she looked at the God who was nearly poised from her mock-assault. She crossed her arms with both pistols in hand. "You having trouble over there?"

He stood straight. "Excuse you." The Kaioshin casually dusted himself off even though he didn't need to. "This is child's play for me." She giggled, and he frowned. "What's so funny?"

"I'm not used to hearing someone talk like you do. I mean, there are people who have proper speaking etiquette and all that, but yours is like fucking… _off the scale._ " Nousha laughed. "I like your voice, though. It sounds nice."

This is the second he had gotten on behalf of his voice. Hopefully, Nousha wasn't having the same thought process as Rebecca did. "Thank… you?"

She regarded him kindly. "Don't Mention It." Without warning, she draw clocked her left hand pistol, aiming directly at Zamasu's head. The Kaioshin was not expecting her sudden move, but he wasn't letting her attack get to him. He didn't have enough time to stop it, so he moved out of the way with it barely grazing his ear. Zamasu turned around to watch the bullet zoom forward, and then he turned back around and gave Nousha a cross look.

"My bad." She smiled. "My hand slipped."

Zamasu shook his head at her. "'Clumsy' human." She blew a raspberry at him. "Is that necessary?"

"It is for me, bro." Nousha flipped her long hair back and approached him, keeping both hands off her pistols of course. Zamasu watched the gait of the gunslinger, it wasn't cat-like but it was very laidback and confident. The fact that she was just like Naz in having a toned and optimal body accentuated it even further, making her look more attractive than usual.

Come on, you have a woman who's an amazing gunslinger, who has a sense of humor, and pretty much loves to play near-dangerous games. What more can you see in that?

Nousha was going to give him a dap, she raised her hand and Zamasu raised his. He made contact with her hand, but then used his mind-over-matter abilities to push Nousha forwards while holding her hand and stepping to the side. The woman stumbled a little from the sudden ploy, and now it was _her_ turn to shoot him a cross look. "Zamasu…"

"My mind slipped."

"Fuck outta here with that." She pulled her hand from him, and playfully slapped his arm. He allowed her to do so, while smirking down at the woman. Nousha shook her head. "You know what, we'll go back to my place and I'll probably whip something up, because I'm hungry now."

"You'd cook for your God?" He raised his brows at her. "That is very thoughtful of you."

"I was talking about myself." She narrowed her eyes at him. "I thought Gods didn't need to eat."

"That doesn't mean we can't enjoy the pleasantry of eating food." He held on to her shoulder and teleported them back to her living room. Nousha looked down at her hips, removing the gadget belt and slinging it over the top of her sofa. She told Zamasu to sit tight in her living room while she gets busy in the kitchen. Even though the Kaioshin liked the idea of solitude for a moment, he wanted to continue learning more about this woman, and her brother. They both were intriguing _humans_ , for starters. He stood up and went to the kitchen to watch her cook up food for the two.

Meanwhile, somewhere a good three miles away, there was a group of black clad men sitting together, talking about the next possible heists to be done. This happened just outside of the cities, near Greenyard, as the men would crack open cold ones while chatting.

"...We could always go straight to that place, and from there meet up with the rest. Afterwards, we'll embark on another."

"That sounds like a good idea." The redhead one said. "No one's gonna know what we're planni-"

A random, silver bullet pierced through one of the criminals heads, right in front of the redhead who paused in the middle of concurrence. The men got up from their chairs, looking down at the dead comrade who now laid on the floor. This man was the one who administered all the crime doings for the _entire_ group.

They all looked at each other before picking up their dead leader, then around the entire scope of the woods-like area, and quickly scampered out of the premise as fast as possible.

.∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩∩.

"So you live another realm altogether?"

"Yes."

Zamasu sat on one of the stools in Nousha's kitchen. He had another cup of black tea made by Naz who was sitting right across from him, and Nousha made the trio a bunch of brownies.

"Can I visit one day?" Nousha was sitting right beside her brother, leaning forward with a smile.

"No regular _human_ is allowed in our godly headquarters." Zamasu crossed his arms and closed his eyes in a ritzy fashion, which made Nousha roll her eyes. "It is a scared premise."

"Well, _God_ ," Nousha smirked. "It was nice meeting ya, for real this time."

"You wanted your proof and you got it, in the form of shooting at him?" Naz frowned at his sister.

"It was a good idea…" She shrugged with a sheepish smile.

Naz instantly did this posh scoff and looked at Zamasu. "She's a risque person, don't let-"

Nousha cut him off, raising a defensive finger to his face. "Hey, look! I didn't _hurt_ anyone oka-"

Naz raised his hand to her face and continued talking. "Don't let her influence get to you before you get carwhirled or something."

Zamasu watched the two, he chuckled at their mini-banter. "I wouldn't let a mere human get to the likes of me, Naz."

"Good." He nodded. "Most people would hate that anyway."

"It's saddening to do such a thing."

"I know right." Naz was agreeing with him. For some reason, Zamasu didn't see a reason to point out that he was human too. They both weren't throwing subs at Nousha though, she knew that. The gunslinger stood up and bopped her brother's head.

Naz shot a look at her. "Excuse _me?_ "

"Don't interrupt me when I'm speaking." She raised a finger at him. "Respect your elders."

Naz kissed his teeth. "Fuck respect."

I may have to disagree with you on that." The regal Kaioshin raised a finger.

Nousha pinched her brother's sweater sleeve."This is what I have to deal with, Zamasu."

"I barely do _anything_ wrong." Naz wiped her hand away. "I'm the best younger brother you could have."

Naz was _younger_ by how many years? Zamasu looked at the pink haired male; he looked way too young to be anywhere near Nousha's age.

"Why can't you be like our cousin?" Nousha shook her head before Naz gave her a look with narrowed eyes.

"Our cousin is _worse_ than me." Naz crossed his arms. "We're literally the same person to you."

She pause for a moment. "...Yeah, you're right. But he's _better_."

"How old are you, Naz?" Zamasu had to interrupt their argument of favoritism.

"I'm like thirty three." Naz answered plainly, before moving strands of pink hair from his bangs. "What? Let me guess; I look much younger, don't I?"

He asked that because Zamasu was surprised to find the this male was two years younger than Nousha. These people must have amazing genes. "You do. The both of you do."

Nousha waved her hand. "It's a family thing. We all look really young."

"I see." They also look like extremely healthy individuals. Pretty much everyone he has met so far is relatively healthy, which is why they are physically attractive; many of the people on this planet take care of their bodies. But these two individuals in front of him had no sort of blemishes, which shows that they have a somewhat exclusive diet or lifestyle that rarely included anything that isn't healthy. That probably plays a part as to why they look so young.

He already knew Nousha worked as a gunsmith, but he learned that Naz was an expert versatile chef who worked in the same bakery that Zamasu went to previously. They spoke a bit more, and Zamasu finally left Nousha's home. He didn't need to fly back, he just teleported straight into Rebecca's living room.

Before he left the house, he had called Rebecca telling her about an event that would render him to be out of the country for a week. At first, he did expect her to rebuke the idea (he'll still go either way), but Rebecca didn't mind it at all. He looked over at the doctor, who was in the kitchen dancing to some really snazzy beat. The thing is, her dancing was so _out of place_ from the music playing; to put it in perspective, it's kind of like someone breakdancing to classical music. He blinked at least seven times before a frown settled on his face.

Rebecca spun around just in time to see Zamasu give her a 'What the fuck are you doing' look. "Heyy…"

"Hello…" he pointed from her phone, which was playing the music to her. And then he inhaled. "I won't ask."

Rebecca watched as he went over to the kettle to make some tea. He had until two days from now to leave, and she wanted to take this time to at least do something with him. So she opted for a movie once again to which he didn't decline. The Kaioshin and the doctor both equally wanted to simmer down together for different reasons.

"Have you ever kissed someone?"

It was a stupid question to ask him, but Rebecca wanted to know. Zamasu blinked a few times before answering plainly. "No…"

"Oh… well, I mean, I _figured_ you haven't but I didn't know if it would be polite to assume that, even if you didn't."

He paused for a moment, taking her statement in, before looking back at the TV screen. "Why are you asking me this?" He always figured that he didn't _look_ like someone who had any romantic experience because… he really doesn't. To the rest of us, it's written all over his face and body.

Rebecca stammered a bit. For a while now, she's been thinking of him in a different way, like ever since he started becoming a dominant force in her house. Sometimes, her mind would wander into thinking about Zamasu might be like if he had a significant other; would he be cold and inexpressive, or would he be a compassionate person? Her guess was that he'd be the biggest sweetheart there is, because of how passionate he is about ideas. If he were to branch that out to other beings in a way that expands his sexuality, anyone who was with him would be the luckiest person on the planet.

Well, first of all, he's a _God_ , he can create a bunch of beautiful bouquets and chocolates to his partner's liking. And his protectiveness over them would be far too cute to ever cheat on. He probably wouldn't be that touchy, but when he does hold you, it's the warmest, most cherishable embrace you could ever have. Rebecca looked downwards. "I was curious."

"Why?"

See, he's also like a child, because one of his trademark words happen to be _why_. You could never answer a question of his without him asking that. "I was just _wondering_ , like… you know. Maybe you would be a great partner to anyone you love."

That is a _weird_ compliment. "Umm… this seems oddly personal."

 _Fuck_ , Rebecca looked up at him, she was practically leaning against his broad shoulder. "It-It's not-"

"Yes it is."

She quieted down, he looked like he was losing his patience. Zamasu continued. "Quit dancing around the topic. You want something from me, and it has something to do with your first question."

That's another problem; he's intuitive, and over the past week she'd swear that he could read everything that's going through her head, including the semi-sexual thoughts she sometimes has. So she couldn't hide from him if she wanted to.

"Well umm…" she looked down at her thumbs. "I kinda wanted to know if you would ever want to kiss someone, out of experimenting and stuff." Suddenly, she sat straight, gaining confidence in her statement. "It's not bad to experiment, you know. Just for the sake of seeing what you like and stuff."

"I figured." He simply replied, and looked back at the TV. He could feel that Rebecca wanted him to 'experiment' with her, it was quite a stretch from his perspective, but it made sense to him. So he shot out the question before Rebecca could swim around the topic again. "Do you want my first kiss to be you?"

Almost instantly, Rebecca's face got _super red_. Her cheeks nearly matched the color of her hair, and she shook her head violently. " _Are you kidding m-_ NO!" The doctor look away. "Okay- well… it's not like you're _not_ attractive or you know… stuff, it's just… I umm…" She rubbed her upper arm while blushing downwards because _dammit_ that's exactly what she wanted. There was a pause between the two, before Rebecca broke. "You know what, _okay_ ; yes, I do wanna kiss you. I've been wanting to for some time but not because of anything weird, I just…Wanna know."

The Kaioshin just stared at her with a tinge of a frown, before he looked elsewhere to ponder the situation. Rebecca wanted to kiss him, a _human_ wanted to kiss a _God_ … Well, excuse him but no one goes near Zamasu in such a fashion, not even the most attractive female or male would be anywhere _near_ him. He's not particularly savvy in the idea of any form of physical… interaction to that extent, but he wasn't no dunce either. He knew what kissing looked like, he knew what sex looked like, he pretty much gathered this knowledge from well, being a God and observing other races. Gods themselves aren't stiff trees, for they too have romantic or sexual partners if they wanted to. He never experienced it, but he's seen how this stuff works.

Would he ever want to try it? He didn't mind. With a human? No human is worth his energy like that, no human that he knows at the moment. But for experimenting? Perhaps, if the person is tolerable, and Rebecca is a tolerable person. If she were to do this, and end up giving him the cold shoulder it wouldn't bother him because he doesn't care.

"Go ahead." Zamasu looked at her and she blinked.

"Huh?"

"I said, go ahead."

"You won't be like… upset, right?"

He shrugged, and then a smirk replaced his neutral face as he suddenly became playful. "Since you happen to know the ropes better than I do, _human_ , give me a demonstration."

In her head, she may or may not have had a eureka moment, but she refused to be too eager about this. "Well…" A smile came over her face, and she slid herself right onto his lap so she was facing him. "I'll hold onto y-"

He already had his hands around her hips. "I know what to do, Rebecca. I asked for a _demonstration_ , do not give me a lesson."

Why did she find that statement super hot? "Oh… okay." At least, she can just get on with this and not have to speak. She slowly came closer to his face, smirking because he sort of backed away a little before their lips finally touched. Rebecca closed her eyes immediately; she didn't expect his lips to be so soft, and she didn't expect him to pull her closer, as well as angle his head in a way to deepen the kiss. Rebecca was taken aback by the sudden _dominance_ he was enforcing and _fuck,_ it was damn sexy. She wrapped one arm around his neck while the other went down his chest, trying to somehow get an upper hand over him until he started to grip her hips. That was one of things that Rebecca _really liked_ , and she pretty much succumbed fully to him as a result.

This whole kiss was only several seconds long, and when they pulled away Rebecca had the most surprised, _flushed_ look on her face, while Zamasu was neutral. His lips cracked a smirk before Rebecca shook her head in amazement.

"How the _fuck_ …" Several seconds in one kiss and she already tell that this man before her didn't like horsing around.

"I asked for a demonstration, you weren't doing enough."

His attractive asshole smirk will be the death of her. "Well _excuse me_. I thought you'd be blown too far away by the close contact." She crossed her arms. "Since you're always uppity whenever I touch you."

"In this moment, it's appropriate." He was being logical again, she wished he can get over that barrier for once. "I am experimenting, I would expect your hand to roam in more places… why are you blushing so heavily?"

 _Roam around in more places_ … You don't just _say_ that, as some really good looking God, and not expect to have a young twenty five year old woman who's been on a painfully long dry spell to get some raunchy ideas. "Zamasu… that sounds really dirty."

He blinked. She was right, but he wasn't thinking of it that way. So he just shook his head at her. "Get your mind out of the gutter, woman."

"Well, you didn't phrase that properly."

"I'm a God, my word is what's correct."

"So when you said Lexi was pretty, is that true?"

"I-" He shot a look at her, this stupid woman was smiling. "Actually, _yes_ , it is true. But that's not what I'm talking about."

"You said your _word_ is correct, it could be anything dude." She shrugged. "Besides, Lexi doesn't know that. I could just tell her-"

"Already did." Zamasu smirked, albeit when he did so he was sort of weirded out.

"Huh?"

"I've spoken with your model friend a couple of times over the phone." He looked up and down at her. "You can get off of me now."

Rebecca placed both hands on his chest. "But you're _comfyyy_ -"

"Off. Now."

She sighed, internally the doctor was frazzled at his stern voice but she still got off of him regardless. "What did you two speak about?"

Zamasu looked to his left, and then to his right. "...stuff."

" _Right. Stuff._ "

He narrowed his eyes. "Excuse you?"

"Look, you don't need to hide it from me. You like Lexi, I know that; but if you're trying to make moves already, then I'll tell Jay on you."

 _ **Snitch**_. It's not even like that, he doesn't want to do that at all! That part of his mind better shut up, right now. "I have no interest in trying anything with her."

" _Right_." Rebecca smirked, and she stood up to stretch. "You know…" She yawned. "I'm tired. I'ma go and sleep."

"Is this your way of avoiding me?" Zamasu crossed his arms. Rebecca does this a lot, and he was playfully asking such a thing.

"Nah, I'm just tired." Her arms fell back to their sides. "Goodnight, Zamasu." She turned around and went upstairs, slowing down just before her head wouldn't be visible to him. "Wait until Irene hears about this."

"WHA-"

"Calm down. I won't actually tell her in person." She giggled.

"You better keep your mouth _shut_." Zamasu raised a finger at her. "She has nothing to do with this."

"I know, I know." Rebecca laughed, and when she simmered down she gave Zamasu a long look before smiling. "Goodnight." With that, the doctor went upstairs and into her room, leaving the Kaioshin alone in her living room. She shut her door and stared at the ground because she was still _shook_ after that interaction; Zamasu actually kissed her! In what universe would this ever be possible?!

Well, this one, of course.

She laid herself in bed, biting her bottom lip. Even though he was just testing and experiencing his first kiss, he did it as though he's had countless women in his own quarters for thousands of years. He was changing at a much faster rate than she could comprehend, imagine what would happen if he managed to get this close with his 'sworn' enemy, Irene, especially knowing how feisty and fiery she could be…

 _Holy. Shit._

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **FINALLY… OH MY FUCKING GOD THEY FUCKING** _ **KISSED**_ **.**

 **Don't get this twisted, don't jump to conclusions ffs; this** _ **does not mean**_ **that they are dating. Not at all, Zamasu is** _ **clearly**_ **experimenting. Don't worry,** _ **avid shippers**_ **, some of you still have hope.**

 **What is the deal with that energy that Zamasu keeps sensing? What do you all think it might be?**

 **That sounds like such an obvious question, but it might not be as easy to answer as you think.**

 **The black vans haven't given up on their crimes schemes, they've dialed down on getting caught with any major crimes while all the more petty ones are being** _ **shoved**_ **to the fore front. We've met three new guys here, Bee and Rogue; both are super-AIs that lived before, during, and after the war. And then Naz, Nousha's brother, who's already well acquainted with the Kaioshin just as much as his sister is.**

 **The year notation goes up by bases of tens (hundred thousands, ten thousands, thousands, hundreds, and then a decimal point followed by the tens and the ones). The planet Zamasu is in hasn't been in a dandy place in the past, but there is way more to this history than he could imagine…**

 **And most of it is going to make him hate humans even more.**

 **By the way, to put it into perspective, this planet is about twice, nearing three times the size of our Earth. So imagine the little amount of people here compared to our [** _ **overpopulated, kind of kidding**_ **] planet; there is hella space there.**


	28. Ambushed

**You might notice that there was a large gap in between updating times. That's because I've been (and still am) going through things that are sort of pushing back my writing and my publishing.**

 **And trust me,** _ **it ain't pretty.**_

 **So, as a result, I've been pushing this fanfic aside for a month, almost quitting it because of the stress in my situation. However, I haven't actually stopped writing because of the mishaps; I just got** _ **hella ideas up the ass**_ **over the course of the month.**

 **Not only for this fanfic, as there are so many that I might have to scrap some out, but for another branch of ideas for another story; I did mention two chapters ago that I was thinking about tapping into Jiren, his backstory, and along with** _ **possibly**_ **a thing for the Pride Troopers (c'mon, we got a dabbing Lorax, you think I'm gonna let that slide?).**

 **I had three different storylines in mind for Jiren: one where he's a God of Destruction (I can** _ **hear**_ **the objection, it will make sense), one where he's originally from U11, from an old race of Greys that were wiped out, and one where he's a manifestation of Belmod from the Super Dragon Balls, and is slapped into the Pride Troopers for a purpose (as well as meeting Toppo). That first one I mentioned is the one that sounds the most interesting, and holds the most character development that I'd have to do (imagine** _ **that**_ **: Jiren's got his own students and shit, owns an entire universe, and then is reduced to a clown's lackee. Gosh, that's brewing :])**

 **If you actually read that whole thing past the first paragraph, I'd be surprised. This was a lot, I am sorta stressed, this is me with brewing ideas to Justice Punch that stress in the face, ok? Okay. On to this chapter, shit's gonna be a brawlhalla...**

 **Just to warn you, this chapter is going be a bit more lengthy. But it's still hype xD.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Ambushed**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Rebecca and Zamasu were pretty much neutral for the next two days, before the Kaioshin had to leave. He told about this thoroughly, and although Rebecca did reject the offer, he won her acceptance with this simple statement:

"I can teleport back to your home, human. You don't need to worry about me."

The question is whether or not he would do it though, and he figured he would.

He figured this would be a chance to see more of the world, like navigating through the cities of Caplax and seeing how different how different they are compared to Tycho.

As weird as it may seem, Zamasu found cities to be quite… intricate. He liked the way they looked from above, despite being built by humans, and such aesthetic appreciation was amplified after he learned that such places were once warzones and badlands less than a century ago. From his extensive reading, Caplax was actually one of the two only countries that weren't hit as hard, but they _still_ suffered from the War itself. The grounds of that country weren't warzones themselves, but many people were bombed, and Caplax was the country with the second most casualties. He had called Adrian and asked about how Caplax looked, and Adrian responded with 'you'll just _love_ the amount of greenery there'.

He wasn't _sold_ with that, but it was an adequate _plus_ to the whole trip.

Rebecca wasn't pushing him away after that kiss, nor did such a thing bring them closer. They just remained the same, and that was what he'd like to expect from the situation, for it was just an experiment. To be fair, he actually didn't _hate_ the action itself; it wasn't bad on his part at all. Rebecca wanted to show him what it was all about, and he ended up taking the reigns because he was getting bored in those seven or something seconds of locking lips with her. It was funny to see her reaction at how _not noobish_ he was, and even more amusing to find that she hasn't been acting weird around him. At least she separated all emotional feeling towards that kiss before it got to her.

The first thing that came about on his phone, just three hours before he was supposed to leave, was a text message from James. Apparently, his user ID was _Basketzz_ and Zamasu spent five minutes trying to decode who and why someone would named themselves after wooden-weaved containers. James told him that he would be driving to the airport, opting to take him there, but Zamasu decided that he'll just fly to the airport instead. Could he fly from Tycho or Caplax? Definitely, but he was curious as to what a first class jet experience would be like after seeing the inside of a private jet Ambrose bought.

Or maybe he made that too, Zamasu didn't really know.

James would give him the OK as to when the Kaioshin would need to leave, and also told him to wear _human clothes_ again. The man did consider the fact that Zamasu didn't have to 'dress all sexily and shit', in James' own words, he could just get something that's comfortable and not misplaced. The Kaioshin decided, since he _didn't_ want to be stared at in the wrong way, to put on black cuffed joggers with a green collar shirt and white sneakers as his getup; simple, comfortable, and not stare worthy. To be fair, Zamasu was attractive enough to wear a cow suit and _still_ look really hot, it's weird, and he knows it's weird.

He spent some time talking to Rebecca about her friendship with Irene, before asking on behalf of her own life. Rebecca has told him numerous times of the kind things Irene had done when she 'fell from grace' back in high school and became known as the many words that she soon associated herself with many years later. The afro-haired friend of hers was a genuine person at the time, but Rebecca would agree that as of now, Irene's kind of losing that same caring spark she once had. But the doctor loved her friend regardless, and Zamasu could say otherwise.

He found that Rebecca absolutely _loved_ talking about her relationship with Adrian, and this was what, like _seven to eight_ years ago. She talked about the times he would drive her home from school even though she had her own chauffeur, how he would make her laugh over the stupidest things, even events that would leave her angry. He would take her to the gym and show her how fun it was to work out because despite having a beautiful body, Rebecca was _not_ fit at all. Their workouts would end with fruit bowls and kisses, and possibly her learning how to play a video game and failing horribly. Her little brother even became savvy with Adrian because the both of them would play videogames together (Adrian was pretty much his gaming _sensei_ ), and the boy was devastated when they broke up and stopped talking to each other. Rebecca herself never, in all this time she said this, expressed how she was affected by their breakup.

From the stories she told Zamasu, he could tell that she dearly _missed_ being around Adrian as a partner. If not that, but the idea of having someone that close to her.

Apparently, he wasn't the only one Rebecca was with. There was another man that she refused to name (or rather she even _forgot his name_ momentarily) who was abusive to her emotionally. Once again, Rebecca would tell him stories, but never would say how these things _affected_ her at all. He had to break the question as to how she felt, and she only told him; "It hurt, but that was what it was." With no emotion whatsoever.

Even as he flew out of her house, he was still pondering why she reacted that way. It was _weird_ to not see some form of reaction from her, he could tell she didn't accept the situation, but human psychology is not something he was extensively savvy with.

The jet ride was _fantastic_ , Zamasu didn't expect a plane to be so… roomy. There was a _lounge room_ , along with a kitchen in which there would be plane service, and he didn't know that was a _thing_. He got the chance to meet the two people of the trip that he didn't know; Shona and Zachary. Zachary was the same man who sang those beautiful songs with an exceptional voice, and Zamasu didn't know this at all because his normal voice sounded _nothing_ like his singing voice. Zachary had red hair and blue eyes, he was very weirdly masculine. Like an effeminate masculinity, but the type that would surely win the hearts of many women and this mostly came from his leisure attitude. He was very chill as a person, despite the fame he had which individually outclassed everyone else besides Shona, and wasn't afraid of saying whatever the heck he wanted to say.

Shona, on the other hand, was the quietest person out of the group mostly, but whenever he had something to say he would have an overall positive flow about him that Zamasu liked. Not only that, but he recognized Shona from several martial arts movies he had watched and wasn't afraid to ask of the styles he knew. He had a charming smile, a kind demeanor overall, and quite the sudden sense of humor, along with an accent that Zamasu found intriguing. Not only that, but since he was friends with Adrian and therefore friends with Jay, the five martial art _nerds_ went on about ki and ki control.

Zachary knew about it but never tried to master it, and James only knew what it was from his guy friends and his girlfriend. Zamasu found out that Shona was a master of _many_ martial art styles, having being trained since he was three years old in the mountains of his homeland. That is one heck of a greater advantage, to train where oxygen levels were quite low, so the fact that he now lives closer to sea level meant that Shona could have hefty endurance. Mace was also into martial arts, both he and Jay grew up under Japanese parents whose fathers and mothers taught them martial arts from their home, and they grew up learning and sparring with each other.

One day, Zamasu thought, he might spar with the four of them, _just_ to see their true expertise in fighting.

The jet finally landed at the Casablanc Airport, located in Caplax just several dozen miles away from the suite that the seven men were staying in. The ride was only six hours, and because of the fact that they were traveling quite far, it was still dusk in Caplax when they landed. The airport was roomy, much like the one in West City, except it didn't have as many glass walls that West City's airport did. Many of the stores were sandstone-themed, contrary to the rustic decor of the restaurants in Tycho. To be fair, Tycho was a versatile city, so it pretty much had every culture within its premise, and also kept many of the Kilikian culture colors intact, which is mostly of a rustic and woody hue. They took a reserved tour bus all the way to the suite itself, and when they got off the men were given respective rooms along with their luggages. For a reason, Zamasu took his normal clothing because he wanted to keep his gi with him at all times.

The suite's living room was a huge as a lobby that could comfortably support a party of people. Once again, the main theme of the place was sandstone; the walls were a textured sandstone colored, the furniture was a light ivory color or a pale yellow, and there were tall potted plants to put greenery into the suite. The walls had an extensive amount of either paintings or or forms of decoration, not enough to make the room look like it was 'suffocating', but it was a nice ample touch to the overall look.

The first thing they did was find a wine cellar which was a cabinet that opened to a _wide_ variety of drinks. The men decided against the wine for tonight, since they were tired as hell.

"You ever had wine before?"

The Kaioshin turned to Zachary, who was drinking a _purple haze_ , said beverage had the classic white wine color with a purple gradient on top. Zamasu looked down at his wine glass before answering. "No."

"Seriously?!" Zachary raised a brow. "Alright, you're lucky you ran into me, I can tell what kind of wine a person would like." Zachary stepped forward to the cooled cabinet of different brands of wine.

"How can you possibly tell what my taste is?" Zamasu crossed his arms, getting playfully testy with the singer.

"Trust me, I have an _eye for detail._ " The singer looked at the tops of the bottles, he didn't even need to pull one out just in case. Within a dozen seconds, Zachary's smirk brightened as he found his picking. "Here, _this_ is one that I know you'll definitely like."

He pulled out a bottle that had very dark yellow glass with an elegant label on it. The label itself was outlined in textured gold, the cursive letters of the name bringing the wine bottle to vibrancy. Zachary handed it to Zamasu and the Kaioshin looked down at it; this wine looked _expensive_.

"What is this?" Zamasu also noticed that there was a divider within the bottle itself that went through the middle of the bottle, even up to where the nozzle was.

"That, my friend, is Amber Rose." Zachary smiled. "It's supposed to be served in a special way. You see how the cap looks like it has two openings?"

Zamasu looked at the cap; it wasn't a regular wooden cylinder, it was a gradient between white and yellow with a small tab in between, and had two opposite ending lips which, like Zachary said, were below their two lips respectively. "Yes."

"You take this little knob here," Zachary held the tab in the middle. "And then you twist it to open either one of the sides. Now, you _always_ gotta have both sides of this drink because if not, it won't feel right."

Zamasu couldn't contain the smirk on his face. He liked how meticulous Zachary was with his wine, just like how the Kaioshin would be if he taught someone how the make tea. "Both sides? Is there a particular order?"

"Well, some people like the white over the yellow, I personally think yellow over white looks and tastes amazing." What he was referring to was the wine itself; one side was yellow, and the other was white. "Which one would you like first?"

Zamasu thought about it. "Yellow, perhaps."

Zachary nodded, and Zamasu watched as the yellow colored wine poured beautifully out of its expensive bottle, and into Zamasu's wine glass. "When you pour this, you gotta make sure the lip touches the glass, and you gotta pour slowly. It's important, especially for the second layer of this wine."

Zamasu figured that out, it's as to not _disturb_ the liquids from their buoyant states. "Ahhh…"

Next came the white, and when Zachary poured it Zamasu noticed that this white liquid was _glistening_ , as if it was sparkling wine of some sort. He watched Zachary carefully pour this drink but the man was swift with it as well, he made it look like an _art_ , and Zamasu respected that a lot. The two liquids did not mix together, the white was above the yellow, and the suspension created a beautiful gradient between the two.

"' _dere he go_." Zachary slid the glass over to Zamasu. Zamasu looked down at the wine glass in front of him, carefully lifting it.

"This looks lively." It really did, the liquids weren't stagnant, they moved and glistened divinely. Zamasu took a calculated sip, his eyes nearly shot open at the exquisite taste; it tasted different from any beverage he's had in his life. It was overall sweet, not _too_ sweet, but the yellow was there to enforce a faint bitter taste, which is the reason as to why Zachary _didn't_ mix the two. Both drinks worked like _yin_ and _yang_ , they balanced sweet with bitter with the slightest tinge of citrus flavor to it. Zamasu blinked like four times, and then he gazed at the beautiful glass before him. "This… this tastes _divine_."

" _Right_?" Zachary placed the bottle back into the cabinet, before clasping his hands together. "Amber Rose is _expensive_ , so… and I know you have an expensive taste."

"You'd be right with that." The Kaioshin was quite pleased that Zachary already knew Zamasu was in for the finest of things. He's a God, what do you expect? "Something tells me you have quite an expertise in this."

"Well, I worked at a bar for like seven years before and while I was singing." Zachary stated. "So… I know my stuff, it kinda grows with you, you know?"

Zamasu took another savory sip out of his wine glass. "I agree. This is aged _divinely_." He looked at the suspended drink before him.

"If anything could age and never get truly old, it's Amber Rose." Zachary chuckled slightly and the Kaioshin took a moment to take that statement into consideration. The two males turned when they heard the other guys call their names.

"Hey, you two," Adrian hopped into the kitchen pointing at the God and the singer. "You guys wanna play truth or dare for like thirty minutes? The rest of us are gonna sleep right after."

"That's literally one of the _first_ things I wanted to do, but I have too much energy." Shona was in the living room when he said that. He walked in the kitchen wearing a red embroidered gi and black pants. "I might stay up for a bit longer."

"That's a gi." Zamasu pointed at Shona's outfit, and the martial artist looked down.

"Yes." Shona looked back at him with a kind smile. He has a really nice smile. "Why? Do you like it?"

"It looks fancy." Zamasu nodded. "What material is it?"

"Brocade." Shona held up one of the sleeves doing his trademark sleeve roll. "It was a gift from my hometown."

"Home- _mountain_." Adrian smirked.

" _Right_." Shona gave him a playful punch on the shoulder.

"You guys, the game is boutta start." Mace bopped into the kitchen, before looking at Adrian and pulling him by the sleeve.

"Uh, _bro-_ "

"Your ass, and their asses. In the living room. Now."

They followed suit with the rest of the team. There were now seven men sitting together in a lavish living room, either on lounge chairs, couches, or the sofa, all circling the middle coffee table. At first, the questions were simple and everyone could pretty much answer accordingly without batting eyes at one another. Within the first ten minutes, things started getting oddly difficult, even for the God amongst the six.

"Would you rather- oh, fuck's sake." They took turns reading the prompts, and this time it was Mace's. The FPICA director shook his head looking at the tablet in his hands. "Would you rather use sandpaper for toilet paper, or vinegar for eye drops?"

This earned cringey sounds from every single one of them, either they tightened their legs together or they squinted their eyes. Shona frowned. "Can you live from that? The eyedrop thing?"

"I ain't one to know." Mace raised both hands. "Both are friggin horrible."

"I already can't handle when soap gets in my eyes." James shook his head. "There's _no_ way I'm taking vinegar for eye drops."

"So you'd wipe your ass with sandpaper?" Jay looked at him. Even though the question was meant to be jokeful, the music producer couldn't help the cringe he got on his spine.

"Listen," James raised a hand, and started chuckling when everyone else did. "I _don't like_ vinegar at _all_. Sandpaper; I can handle it, I think..."

Adrian pinched the bridge of his nose. "Bruh, imagine the sound of that-" he proceeded to make some really gritty noise that make all the guys shiver.

"Adrian," Zamasu looked at the music procedure, who gave him a stupid smile. "Stop it."

"You're not exempt from answering this question, _Adri_." Mace crossed his arms.

"Are you calling me out?"

"I don't have to."

"Bitch," Adrian looked him up and down. "Why don't _you_ answer it then?"

"This isn't about me." Mace leaned forward as he sat back. "This is about you."

Was it mentioned that these two, being the most reactive funny guys in the group, banter a lot?

"You know what…" Adrian looked to the ground. "Gosh, I'll have to take it; I choose sandpaper."

Jay shivered. "I can't deal with vinegar at _all_ , fuck that. I'll have to choose sandpaper too."

"Are you guys not factoring in the fact that you _excrete_ after using the restroom?" Zachary raised a hand. "Sandpaper is not an efficient cleaning agent."

Jay leaned forward. "Oh, and vinegar is?"

"Well, _duh_."

"For your _eyes_?"

"...Fucki- you got me. But still, I'll take the vinegar eyedrops because ain't no way I'm putting sandpaper on my ass." Zachary waved his hand.

"I call for vinegar eyedrops." Shona raised his hand. "I hate sandpaper."

"Shona, you're the most metal out of all of us." Zachary turned to the martial artist. "Refer back to your training methods."

He wasn't wrong, Shona was an exceptionally strong person. As a child, he would carry weights, do pushups with his fingers, and run up and down the mountain. All of that and then some accounted for his form of practice. "I wouldn't say I could stomach down the idea of putting vinegar in my eyes."

"They didn't specify the type though, as long as it's not white vinegar." Adrian made an amazing point, to which all the guys cringed and agreed. "Alright nex- _waiiit,_ Zamasu! You didn't answer, dude!"

"I'm a God, not a 'dude'." Zamasu narrowed his eyes at Adrian, he could've let the name bypass but the Kaioshin didn't want to answer that Would You Rather, because _no_.

"Okay, _God_." Adrian nodded at him. "Answer it; sandpaper, or vinegar?"

Zamasu suddenly had quite a eureka moment, as well as realizing he had the highest advantage out of everyone else. "Vinegar." He shrugged. "Because I wouldn't need to use eyedrops in the first place."

"..." Adrian shook his head at the Kaioshin. "That's not fair."

"It kind of is, for me." Zamasu smirked at him, and Adrian looked at Zachary.

"Zach, if you cared about me, you'd hit him for me."

"Adrian," Zachary was lounging back on the couch beside Zamasu, sheepishly smiling. "I love you and all, man... But I'm lazy."

"...I'm getting you later, asshole." Adrian smirked at the singer, who casually raised the finger at his friend. Zamasu watched the exchange, how do two amicable people just treat each other like that? He's never had a friend that he could openly call an 'asshole', but that will change in time.

"Wow, next one…" Shona was passed the tablet from Mace. "Have a… have a penis-sized nipple, or a nipple-size penis?"

"Wait, what the fuck…" Zachary blinked.

"Hold on, is THAT the question?" James' eyes widened.

"What kind of _question_ is that?!" Zamasu exclaimed. Who would ask such a thing?

"I dunno!" Shona shrugged. "Why did we choose the most ridiculous ones?"

"I concur." Zamasu honestly didn't have to worry about this question, at least 50% of it, because he didn't even have nipples. But the _other_ side of the coin was semi conflicting because in terms of his species' biology, they are supposed to be a bit bigger than average. It has nothing to do with size, Gods have the ability to make you lose it with the use of their fingers _only_.

"Imagine Zamasu's reaction to seeing our species with penises for nipples." Mace snorted.

Adrian chimed in. "He'll just go like…" Suddenly, the fellow music producer sat up really straight and poised and his voice changed. " _ **Wow, the humans have large nipples, now**_ _._ "

Jay nearly spat out his drink, while everyone else bursted out laughing. Everyone except for one particular green person because… "He sounded _just like_ Zamasu, holy shit!" Mace looked at his cousin who doubled over in laughter.

" _I don't sound like th_ -!" Zamasu stopped himself and pinched his nose because he couldn't even deny the fact that Adrian deadass sounded just like him. _He does sound like me!_ The Kaioshin groaned loudly.

"My bad bro, I had to." Adrian snapped his fingers and pointed at Zamasu with a smile on his face. "But umm… okay, I mean, you know us guys can vouch for the fact that we don't want nipple sized penises."

"Forget about the whole _size_ thing, it would be hard as hell to piss if that were the case." Jay said.

"Can we not divulge on this topic?" Shona looked just as reasonably uncomfortable as the rest of the guys. "Why did I have to get the horrible one…"

"Who says we gotta _answer_ it?" Mace brought up a good point; this isn't some tourney where doing the wrong thing would get you erased from the face of existence. There weren't any rules stipulated here. "We can just skip it-" he stopped to yawn.

"Yup. Please do." Zachary insisted.

Zamasu agreed with him. "Indeed."

"Alrighty, last one." Shona passed it to Zachary. The red haired singer took the tablet in his hands, and almost instantly a smirk overcame his face. "I like this one… would you rather fuck the richest man in the world and only get 1000 Zent, or fuck a poor man and win a million-Zent lottery?"

"Wow, how surprising; you have sex with a poor man and _somehow_ end up winning the lottery." Adrian snorted.

"Right?" James cracked his knuckles.

"You _know, the richest_ dude in the world is also quite good looking." Jay could sort of vouch for the first option, even if his girlfriend has a major fan crush on the trillionaire.

"I had the privilege of meeting him." Shona was looking down at the ground.

"Really?!" Mace looked at him. "What is it with you people meeting this dude outta nowhere? First Zamasu, now you?"

James' eyes went wide. "Wait, Zamasu met Ambrose?" He looked at Jay, who did nod. "There is hella shit we don't know about you, Z."

Zamasu looked at the other men. "I don't understand why you all get so… excited when his name is brought up."

"Well, to be fair, he's apparently the most innovative person alive right now. Don't you live with Rebecca?" James asked. "I thought she'd be kind enough to tell you about him, she's a doctor and shit."

Zamasu never asked Rebecca about him. "I wouldn't need to, I could just go back to where he is and ask questions myself."

"Probably one of the most _boss_ things I've heard Zamasu say." Jay chuckled, and he answered the impending question that the guys all had. "He's a God, so he can fly and teleport and shit."

"Regard my abilities with respect, Jay."

"Oh my bad; and _stuff_." Jay corrected himself, and Zamasu almost chuckled at his dry humor.

"Aren't we all rich, technically?" James said. "So we wouldn't need to answer this question."

"James, every time there is a question regarding physical contact with another dude, you always wanna switch the subject up." Adrian said, and this wasn't some sort of _hushed_ information; everyone could figure out that things like that weren't James' style. Not only that, but the basketball player himself found it weird to regard some rich attractive geek so highly. The same type of person, to him, seems like someone who's socially inept. Not that his friends were downright on their knees praising Ambrose, but James would like to think that the ' _hype'_ is not needed, even though that same hype is mostly respect.

Well, that's one thing he and Rebecca partially have in common. While James didn't feel the need to address Ambrose higher than, say, some asocial highschool teen sitting in front of stacks of textbooks, Rebecca straight up disliked Ambrose for the simple reason of skepticism. She never met him, and this wasn't something anyone really knew, but whenever the trillionaire's name was brought up, she'd try to change the subject. She doesn't like how they put this rich man on a pedestal, and _extrusively_ finds him annoying.

"I'm still answering it; richest guy in the world is getting it." Zachary always had this 'No fucks given' attitude. He wasn't gay, but his sexuality was somewhere between straight and _I don't care._

"Ambrose over anyone." Jay snapped his fingers, while Adrian gave him a look for his boldness. "Just saying."

"Eh, Ambrose." Shona shrugged.

"I'm calling Ambrose on this one, because why not?" Mace raised both his hands up with a shrug.

"Do I really have to answer this question?" James slouched back on his seat.

" _Yes._ " Everyone, save for Zamasu, smirked at the basketball player, because they're all evil for pulling him into this.

Mace leaned forward. "Tell me; Why do you get so uncomfortable whenever _his_ name is brought up?" And _specifically_ Ambrose's name.

"Because I'm straight as fuck."

Adrian snorted. "That's part of the reason, and the bigger reason is that James hates nerds and geeks and shit like that. He just thinks Ambrose is a 'lucky geek'." The producer put air quotes to show that those last words were from James himself.

"But he's friends with you, and you're a music geek." Zachary frowned.

James verified his statement. "Adrian is a cool guy, I can't even call him a geek. This one right here is not asocial as hell."

"You haven't even met Ambrose." Jay laughed. "What if he's just as cool as the rest of the us?"

"You don't know that either." James gestured. "I'll pass this question."

"Fine then. How about you, Zam-"

"I'll pass." The Kaioshin instantly said. "I don't do those things with humans."

"Hmm…" Zachary nodded slowly. "So what do you do those things with?"

" _Wh-_ Don't ask me such a question!"

"Why not?" Zachary tilted his head, his ponytail following him.

" _Fix your wording first_!"

" _Oh…_ okay, I meant _who_? Other God's?"

"Umm…" He never considered his tastes in that way, so he really didn't know.

"Or have you not been around to experimenting enough?"

Zamasu gave Zachary a look. "I'd rather not spoil what my tastes are."

"Why?" Now, Zachary was full on teasing him. "Because I might be in that list?"

"W- _No!_ " Zamasu got really weirded out at the idea, and the fact that he just _said_ that. Zachary simply didn't give a crap.

"You two have only met each other for several hours in the plane, and you guys are already fucking with each other." Adrian smiled.

" _NO WE'RE NOT!"_ Zamasu gave Adrian and very cross look, and then Zachary leaned over to tap Zamasu's shoulder.

"He didn't meant it sexually, he just meant that we talked a lot in a short amount of time."

Zamasu paused. "Oh…" He then whipped his gaze back to Adrian. "You could have worded that _better_!"

" **I am deeply sorry for using the incorrect** -"

" _I don't sound like that!"_ He cross his arms and looked away from the damn music producer as everyone laughed, because he'll have to inwardly admit; Adrian does an _amazing_ impression of him.

"You kids are crazy." Mace shook his head.

"Oh? And how old are you?" James shot a look at Mace, who smugly leaned back into his seat.

"He's thirty four." Jay said.

"Oh, never mind." James retracted, making the Kaioshin snort.

Zamasu then crossed his arms. "You should not be talking, Mace."

" **You really should no-** "

" _Adrian."_ Zamasu gave Adrian a stern look before continuing. "I'm older than all of you combined."

"How old are you?" Shona asked. And Zamasu took some time to really crunch his numbers because he stopped counting after a while.

"Three hundred fifty seven thousand, seven hundred and eighty six."

All the human males leaned forward concurrently with dumbfounded expressions, and a mixture of 'what', 'shit' or 'damn'.

Then Zachary's swift ass smirked and went- " _Wit' yo old ass_."

"One day, I might just punch you." Grey eyes locked onto blue until Shona raised a finger.

"Violence isn't a good thing, Zamasu." Shona's accent sounds nice when he says his name.

" **Violence is never the answer for a** _ **God**_ **.** "

"I will _castigate_ the _both_ of you." Zamasu pointed between both Adrian and Zachary. He would have to say that it's the first night in Caplax, and he truthfully wasn't having a bad time at all.

A while later, five of the seven of them decided they would sleep the night off, while Shona stayed up for a bit longer. The martial artist was sitting in the living room with both feet propped on top of a comfy footrest, and an elbow propped against the armrest of the couch. The look on the superactor's face was pensive, and borderline perturbed.

It hadn't been a week from the time he encountered Terry in a back alley at South City, but the look of those men who fought with him were much more canny than what Terry had told him. Was whatever Terry went through Shona's business? In the most unselfish way possible, no it wasn't, but this seems far too complex for just some guys to run and jump someone. Shona had seen that these men had similar tags, and for some reason they were the only four people out at such a time of night. From what Terry told him, he was being followed, and Shona could tell that Terry was being targeted by whatever means for these criminals and their leader or leaders. He can understand why Terry wouldn't want to give such information away, because Terry probably did not want Shona to get involved, or possibly be targeted, in this situation.

"You look worried."

Shona blinked when he heard the sound of Zamasu's voice. The living room was silent, and Zamasu had been in his room ever since some time ago, Shona didn't know what time it was. He decided to be just as elusive as the information he had gathered. "Kind of."

"What bothers you, then?" Zamasu had been in his room for more than an hour after the rest of the men fell asleep, and changed into his usual purple gi top and blue pants because they're familiar. He actually expected Shona to fall asleep just as fast as the others did, but he now knew something else about the martial artist; He was a night owl. Shona can stay up late at night and wake up in the morning at a normal time. But tonight, something was bothering the martial artist.

"Well," Shona leaned forward, folding his hands against his knee, "I ran into some problematic people late at night, and they fought me, and lost…" He humbly said the last part, cracking a smirk out of Zamasu. "They seemed like a gang of some sort."

Zamasu slowly nodded, while sitting down next to Shona. "Why would this bother you so much?"

"Have you not seen the crimes lately?" Shona looked at him. "I don't know if you like looking at crimes or the news or anything, but I think that incident was something bigger than what it was."

"Did they drive a black van?"

"I don't know. When I found them, they were in a back alley beating someone up." Shona let the elusivity go a little bit.

Zamasu intuitively felt the need to ask who it was, but he decided against it because it didn't seem important to him. "How could you tell they were coordinated?"

"They had the same exact tags on their shirts." Shona's brow creased. "They looked weird, but too weird to be some random logos or whatever."

The Kaioshin had his full attention on Shona. "Do you think they were after you?" He actually forgot about the black vans, they have near disappeared Tycho, and of all the times he had went out, he hadn't actually _seen_ a black van outdoors at all.

"No, not me." Shona shook his head. "The other guy I found there."

Was this person of any importance? "Who was he?"

"He's a gynecologist." Shona said. "All he told me was that these guys were just 'randomly' following him, and they went to jump him."

Zamasu looked at the ground momentarily. That answered his question, partially. "You should probably tell that director at least."

"Already did. Mace knows, he has many teams in different crime scenes and all that stuff. This is something he's been looking at for weeks now, and it's only been the past few days where he wouldn't need to super-supervise."

"How could he just leave such a thing unhinged like that?" Zamasu frowned.

Shona looked at Zamasu. "He has intendants, under intendants, under _intendants_ , and from what I'm told most of them are those AI people so he's covered."

 _That makes sense._ You really can't have a bunch of _humans_ taking full care of such scatterbrained crimes, they'd mess everything up. Zamasu didn't think that artificial intelligence would be involved with all the human conflicts, but they were probably programmed that way. Yep, Endmite showed him the gist of what supersmart machinery end up going through.

He's adding that to the bucket list of what to ask that Chandler AI about.

"And… I hope…" Shona was yawning, holding his hand over his mouth with such proper etiquette. "It doesn't get worse, at least." He stretched his arms out, before looking at Zamasu with a face. "I'm tired."

He chuckled. "I can see that." Zamasu stood up and looked at Shona. "Go sleep."

"Good plan." Shona tiredly laughed, and he stood up while looking down at his gi. "Good night. I'll see you tomorrow and stuff." With that, Shona strolled into the third hallway to the right of the living room, leaving Zamasu alone in the living room.

When the Kaioshin heard a door closed, and minutes afterwards whilst thinking back to what Shona had told him, he thought of finding that AI again. Then, his thoughts went to Ambrose, the man in the lab suit he met two weeks ago. He didn't realize just how much he had managed to _see_ ever since he had left Irene's house. He got the chance to see how truly big the world is, and also learned that those on this planet had _just_ started their own succession after a largely devastating war. He would have never knew that this planet was giant, he would have never knew that these people exist… he's spent two weeks seeing and discovering, and despite it being in a completely different way he couldn't help but think it was refreshing to learn something new more than once in awhile.

Isn't that a shocking realization, that he actually wants to learn about this planet, this planet that has human, mortal inhabitants; the same type of beings that fight, kill, and humiliate each other out of fear and power. Subconsciously, he wanted to know more as to _why_ , why did they want to do all of this, why they keep repeating the same things over and over again. What he used to push away and despise extrusively, he now wanted to learn more about, in the most unexpected way possible.

•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•o•

Ethan had _never_ , in his twenty three years of living, seen such a building that looked so beautiful, yet so scary at the same time. He was standing in front of Rose Corp; the large building spanned _very wide_ , and was a couple to a few hundred feet tall. The architecture itself was very complex; the outside was bustling with different people, the entrance walkway had green divided patches with a really big statue in the middle of a fountain and don't get it twisted, this entrance opening spanned at least seventy feet before you reach the actual doors of Rose Corp. The statue itself was moving on its own, it was a ring-like shape that would invert in and out and shine with the sun, the water funneling out would look mesmerizing, if he didn't have an appointment within eight minutes, he could stand right outside and just stare at this thing all day.

If one could get a satellite view of Rose Corp, the roof would be very rounded and grid like since the building was _heavily_ solar powered, coupled with a large glass circular opening that revealed an outdoor lounge room, this same place had tables, benches, many trees, smaller fountains and whatnot. There were four divisions of the building, each of equal height and width, and on the side of the building were very large greenhouses. This entire place, if you add up the greenhouses, the Corp itself, the parking lots, the _plane_ docks (yes, this place had plane docs, there are certain people who don't particularly live nearby that work there, so they can just fly there), it would be a good 2,000 feet wide.

This was where Ethan was going to work at, _this_ was the place he applied to. It almost seemed too good to be true, such an environment looked beautiful from the outside. He sauntered to the entrance finally, entering the main lobby to see the receptionist desk. The premise was spacey, it had couches where you could wait when you need to, and smart water fountains in case you get thirsty.

The receptionist looked up at Ethan, he moved his wheeled office chair forward behind his desk. "Good afternoon, sir."

"Good afternoon." Ethan said almost too quickly, he rummaged through his portfolio to find something. He didn't realize that he was also right on time, despite missing a train or two. "I have an appointment with…" He found the small piece of paper. "Avery Va Dinci?"

"Ethan Nates?"

A second male voice came about from the side of the reception desk. Ethan looked up to see the man who called him. "Yes?"

" _Great_." Avery gave him a sweet smile, before his face got serious. "Human resources has quite the wisecrack of humor." His smile came back with a slight chuckle, and Ethan blinked. "Follow me."

They left the main lobby, into a divided portion of the lobby where many of the elevators were. Avery gave him the basic rundown as they went up the elevator and into the eighth floor. The elevator itself was smooth and quick, so they got there in less than half a minute in such a giant building. Avery was walking in front of him and leading Ethan to his office.

"Okay, so I was Ambrose's second assistant, but his administrative assistant recently got promoted, and so I'm now the admin." Avery's walk made his wavy hair bunce with him. Ethan looked down at himself.

"So you're promoted too?"

"Yes, Ambrose discharged the last three individuals after only two weeks." Avery turned back to him. "We need to find someone who can think and thrive here, you understand?"

"I understand." Ethan was doing that thing that we all do when we're about to get a job; kissing ass. Just _slightly_ , and to Avery it sounded amusingly annoying. "So what do you do here? Like, job wise?"

"I will pretend you didn't just ask me that." The admin assistant gave him a side eye while he walked. "This is the same place where all the mathematicians and scientists are, not to mention it's owned by a legend. You work a _year_ here, and you can land any job in the computer field you could think of." He opened the glass door to the joint offices. "Millions of men and women alike would kill for this job."

"It sounds like a great opportunity, I'd love to be considered." Ethan smiled at Avery, who was still walking in front of him. Avery turned around with a chuckle that was a _wee_ bit condescending, and when he finally faced Ethan he pursed his lips before quickly sizing him up within a second. "Ethan… Rose Corp consists of mostly computer engineering, so an understanding in computers is _crucial_."

Ethan frowned with the same kind smile on his face. "What makes you think I don't understand computers?"

Avery was _about_ to answer that question, until he heard his phone ring a message notification. He pulled it out of his pocket and looked at the message with gradually widening eyes. "Oh… shit, shit _shit_!" Suddenly, the admin turned around and scampered towards the phone that was on his desk, picking it up and placing it in front of his ear.

"Yes… he's on his way… tell _everyone_!" Avery hung up quickly, and someone had entered right after he did so. The individual was wearing a casual velvet black trench coat with a crocheted scarf that was tucked poshly underneath the coat. He was holding a case in one hand, and his other mechanical hand was holding his visor.

Chandler placed the case on Avery's table, and took hold of the red folder right next to it. "He's not supposed to be here until tomorrow morning."

Avery was looking at his desktop monitor. "Well, his chauffeur had just text messaged me mere minutes before they'll arrive." He shook his head and scoffed. "Ugh, these people."

Chandler sighed, before almost walking passed a wandering-eyed Ethan and turning around while he whistled to catch Avery's attention. He then raised the folder covering his face from Ethan and pointed while mouthing 'Who is that?'

Avery waved his hand while shaking his head. " _That,_ I ought not to talk about."

Ethan looked back at Avery right after Chandler shrugged and went to the intercom on Avery's desk.

The AI tapped a button, before speaking into the intercom for everyone to hear. "Alright, everybody; Crunch time!"

Immediately after Chandler said those words, everyone within this particular floor started running about, including Avery who zipped past the very confused Ethan with the case Chandler brought in. He opened its contents and placed them into a cabinet in the office behind his outside desk. Ethan turned around to look out the glass window and at the hallway; there were men and women going around rapidly to where they should be.

Meanwhile, a suede black car pulled up in front of the entrance of Rose Corp. The trillionaire's velvet dress shoes took a step onto the well kept pavement before he completely stepped out of his car.

"Sit over there." Avery directed Ethan to the seat right across from his own desk hurriedly. Ethan sat and watched as the assistant prepped everything up swiftly in less than a minute. He looked at the desk in front of him; from what Ethan could guess, he would be working on this giant, roomy and well-organized desk, not to mention he also had a really snazzy looking computer in front of him, along with a printer next to it (in this planet, a printer isn't huge).

The boss approached and stepped into the elevator quietly just before an employee was about to. She quickly gave him a polite 'Good afternoon Mr. Sarashina' before switching to a different elevator; not because he was rude or anything, but being on an elevator with your boss sounds… uncomfortable.

Avery fast walked out of the joint offices and into the hallway, and turned around to walk with his boss right when he saw him. Ambrose was looking over documents that were given to him by other fashion designers.

The soft voiced male handed the documents to Avery. "I don't see what's so difficult about scheduling an appointment."

Avery knew what Ambrose was talking about. Since he left Lyn before his boss did, he was appointed to answering many of the phone calls that he knew were bound to come after the fashion show. A person's hands can only travel so fast when a phone is ringing off its hinges. "I'm so sorry, Ambrose; I've tried to get a hold of every single designer that called while you were awa-"

"You don't need to tell me." Ambrose raised a finger, already knowing what Avery meant. His assistant quickly silenced. "Tell Saffron that I'm not approving the man he sent me for the Mandalian layout. I asked for a Himurian, athletic, smiley and he sent me rogue, lazy, and grouchy. And there's an open bar for the Khors party that i was invited to, I'd like the driver to drop me off at 8:50 and pick me up at 12:55 _sharp_." Avery uttered the timing under his breath to better remember it as he and his boss entered the main joint office. "Give the tertiary blueprints to Evan for distribution around the agriculture section, they are already on your desk as I assume Chandler left the case with them in there. I'll be in my office fixing one of the scanners so tell Hugo to hold off his exhibition transcript, that of which I can rectify later. Who is that?"

Ambrose didn't even pause to look at Ethan or ask that question while he walked into his own office, but he still knew of the young man's presence, sitting way too stiffly on the chair across from Avery. Avery walked in front of the open double doors in front of Ethan, blocking Ambrose's view of him. "Nobody- I mean, human resources sent him our way for a job as your second assistant." And then he started cracking up at the idea. "But he's _hopeless_ in such a regard and in-"

"Well I ought to see him myself because the last three that came in weren't well fit for such a job. So, send him in." Ambrose sat down in his cloud office chair. Avery quickly turned around, and looked at Ethan who had wandering eyes everywhere in the joint offices. He snapped his fingers in front of Ethan making him blink and then motioned for him to go into Ambrose's office.

Ethan stood up and walked over to the opened sliding doors, taking a glance at the office itself. It was _huge_ ; many supercomputer cabinets on one end of the room, while the rest of the room had spotless windows that gave a healthy, beautiful view of the outside of the building. The floor was carpeted with a very red hue, and the walls that weren't large windows were an ivory color with varying decorations and _mostly_ potted plants. The master desk itself was sectional and about as wide as Ethan's height, and that was where his boss was sitting. Ambrose was taking out laminated papers as Ethan walked in and once the man was several feet in front of him Ambrose made eye contact with him. Ethan blinked, and then inadvertently took a baby step backwards.

Ambrose's eyebrows raised as he addressed the younger man. "Who are you?"

Ethan had a bad habit of saying 'umm' all the time and that was what he started his sentence with unfortunately. "I'm Ethan Nates," he then slid the resume including his education, work experience, and whatnot. "I recently graduated from University of Grand Literature."

Ambrose looked at it momentarily while wiping the outer lens to a scanner's camera. "And what are you doing _here_?"

Ethan paused for a moment, before slowly answering his question. "I…Think I could do a job as your assistant." Ambrose blinked before looking down momentarily. "I have won many contests and have made articles for some high tier companies, and I also have a Advanced Degree in Writing…"

"So you're not familiar with Losgistics?"

Another pause before Ethan answered his question. "No."

Ambrose was looking elsewhere. "And before today, you've never worked with computers?"

"...No…" Ethan said unsurely.

Ambrose spoke in a slight uptone while looking down at the paper in front of him. "You have little comprehension of how engineering is..."

"Umm…" Ethan frowned with a smile. "I think that depends on what type of engin-"

"No, no." Ambrose raised and waved a finger while looking back at Ethan calmly. "That wasn't a question."

The younger male blinked for the umpteenth time, watching as Ambrose returned his attention to the papers. He swallowed the nervousness back down, and tried to approach this a different way, because this man wasn't being communicable at all. "Well, I have written various articles about computer engineering, one of which was on the board of Mathletes and…"

Ethan stopped when he noticed that Ambrose took out a large book, calmly placing it on his own desk, and read through it while Ethan was talking about his achievements (which weren't easy to get, he struggled hard to do most of those feats). Ethan blinked, confused as to why this man wasn't giving him eye contact, and not paying attention to what Ethan was saying.

Little did he know, Ambrose _was_ listening to what he was saying, but he already caught on to the fact that Ethan was simply regurgitating words.

"...I umm… I also wrote for a newspaper magazine under the subject of architecture and partaken in a national literature contest for the Open Minds of-"

"Great."

Ethan stopped mid-sentence when Ambrose cut him off with the most plain compliment anyone could get. He didn't say it condescendingly or irritatedly at all either, his voice was neutral. Ethan blinked as he looked down at the boss who was paying more attention to the book in front of him than to Ethan. Ethan looked to the side, before suddenly scoffing quietly; the blatant disregard the trillionaire was showing actually got on his nerves, and he turned around to walk out of the office.

He then turned around again, to face Ambrose again who stopped flipping through the pages. "Okay, you know what, I get it; I _don't_ belong here. I'm not a genius, I'm not some high level person this company would need, but I am _smart_." At this point, Ambrose was looking at him with a neutral, unreadable expression on his face, and Ethan still continued. "I am a quick learner, I can adapt quickly, and I'll work very har-"

Chandler walked right past Ethan with a tablet in hand, approaching his boss while talking. "A few articles of prints have been sent out to other companies, they've picked them up really quickly." Ethan watched the AI as he breezed past him, while Ambrose kept his attention a little longer before turning to address Chandler's tablet. "As for the collection itself, so far it's being published worldwide."

Ethan looked between the two, and then slowly backed away with a crooked wave. "Thank you for your… time." He then turned around and walked out of the joint offices with his head down.

Chandler frowned at the man he saw beforehand. "Who is that sad person?" Ambrose glanced back at the front doors to the joint offices before he and Chandler looked at the tablet in hand. "Is there some sorta before and after shot that Avery doesn't know about?"

Ethan exited the prestige building fast walking, and not looking at anyone else. He called up a taxi and went to stand at the end of the street where Rose Corp was. With a shameful sigh, he shook off the events in his head and looked down at his phone… _I didn't get the job_ …

V!-!-!-!-!-!V

"I've never had a massage before."

"There are a _lot_ of things you're gonna need to try out, bruh." Jay looked at Zamasu. Of the seven guys in the group, the six of them were sitting on comfy chairs getting luxury massages from female masseuses. One of which actually tried to flirt with Zamasu because _duh_ he's attractive, and it ended just as badly as some guy stepping on his prom date's shoe while they dance. The amount of cringe was enough to make Zachary switch places with the Kaioshin so that he was sitting to the far left across from Zamasu.

It was _that_ bad.

Zamasu was sitting side-by-side with both Adrian and Shona, and Jay was sitting with Mace and Zachary. The Kaioshin didn't know why humans needed massages for and why this place was so extra when it came to that; they even got these fancy robes to wear over their boxer-clad bodies, and the women who were massaging them were sweet enough to sometimes tag along in their conversation. James would've been there, but he needed to go do his drills, leaving the rest out to do whatever they please.

Zamasu just happened to realize that a lot of the female's here had that same afro hair that Irene had, matter of fact many of the natives did have either that, or some form of braids. Some of them had the lightest blue eyes coupled with milk chocolate skin, quite an exotic combination. But the woman were kind and sweet, they asked if any part of their bodies hurt whenever they'd massage them, and tended to them quite well.

Maybe that's because the people he was with were rich and he was also a God but that's not their knowledge.

"So what's good with Ashley?" Mace asked. "How come she wasn't invited?"

"Well first of all, she's busy writing stuff." Adrian said, which made Zachary snort.

"Quite descriptive."

"Shush it, redbone." Adrian shot a look at Zachary who raised a hand in an 'I'ma slap the comedy out of you' gesture. "She's busy, and also this is sort of an all guys thing, like… to invite her would be weird."

"Not to mention you're getting massages from these beautiful women next to you." Jay had a smug smile on his face.

"Uhh _yeah_ , she'd pull my ear sideways or something."

"How do you pull an ear sideways?" Zamasu frowned.

"Well what you do is you take an ear-"

The redhaired singer jumped in. "Just go find a random ear and take it, I presume."

"Zach, I will deck you." Adrian raised a finger at the singer who smiled. "So you _grab someone's ear_ , and then ya like twist it but sideways."

"If you twist an ear, wouldn't it be sideways anyway?" Shona said.

"Exactly, like… it's the same thing." Jay shrugged slightly, as to not perturb the women against his shoulders.

"Or maybe you gotta have the person sideways to twist their ear sideways." Zachary shrugged.

Mace added. "But then that would still constitute as it being sideways because when you twist something, it's being rotated to a side or some shit-"

"It makes _sense_!" Adrian raised his hand with a comical OK symbol.

"Why are we talking so in depth about twisting ears?" Shona gave the guys a look.

"Because _Hocus Pocus Magic Guy_ wanted to know how to twist an ear sideways." Zachary gestured to Zamasu, who frowned at him before using Adrian, Lexi and Irene's favorite phrase.

"I have a _name_ , you know." This made the women quietly giggle amongst each other at Zamasu's statement. "You didn't need to go into so much detail."

"You wanted to know."

"Not _that_ much information, you idiot!"

"Too much info is never enough, my friend." Zachary wagged his finger with a smirk on his face, blue eyes meeting grey. They gave each other glares as Shona noticed a few guys enter the massage room. Periodically, other people would stroll in here, and all of them were men. Right now, the huge massage room wasn't packed, the closest people were just three rows ahead of the six guy friends. There was one person in particular Shona had recognized; the male the superactor was looking at was a rival of his in his earlier years during and before the 15th World Martial Tournament, which was fifteen years ago. He had short black hair, dark brown eyes, and chiseled facial hair. The man turned his head just in time to catch Shona looking at him, and he gestured for the few other men alongside him to find seats while he stood there for a moment, giving Shona a really smug smirk before going to sit with his large crew.

"Are you two gonna stop arguing?" Mace suddenly said, and Shona had realized that the God and the singer were both bantering, _again_.

"What are you looking at Shona?" Adrian leaned forward to look at the actor, who shook his head.

Shona gave him a simple response. "I thought I saw someone I knew."

"And you thought correctly."

It was at this time the guys, including the masseuses, turned to the direction of the unfamiliar voice that was right behind Zachary. The same guy stood quite leisurely, he had a silken robe on and was holding an empty martini glass. "Well, I'll _assume_ you did. I don't think your memory would fail _you_ at such a young age, wouldn't it?" He smiled courteously at the group, and everyone had a mix of neutral and confused expressions on their faces.

Shona's eyes became narrow.

"Uhh, who are you?" Zachary turned around to address him, quietly telling the masseuses to release him.

"That's Shigeru Sazaki." Jay clarified. "Dude who went against Shona in the final match of the fifteenth tourney."

"Precisely." Shigeru clasped his hands together, and went to stand right by Shona. He knelt down so that he was face level with the superactor, smiling at Shona in the kindest way possible. Both Zamasu and Adrian exchanged looks before turning back to the pair.

"Why are you here?" Shona blinked at him, and at this moment all the masseuses kept their hands off of them because they were all invested in what this guy wanted. Every single one of them could sense the malicious intent in Shigeru.

"I just came here to say hi. To a _friend_ , that's all."

"We aren't friends."

Shigeru chuckled. "I never said it was you, Shona." The superactor frowned. "I didn't think I'd meet you again after all these years. How's it been?"

"It's been great." Shona answered plainly, and then he shifted himself to face Shigeru fully. "If you have any _tricks_ up your sleeve, then let them out now."

"Why are you so crotchety?" Shigeru raised a brow. "I'm here to greet you and we're already off on a cold foot, I don't understa-"

"That's not the reason why you're here, _Sazaki_." Shona used Shigeru's last name out of nowhere, and the rival himself raised both brows now.

Shigeru paused momentarily with a frown, before looking down and then smiling. "You know what… you're right." He slowly stood back up. "It wasn't; but it would be nice to introduce the _calm_ before the _storm_ , wouldn't it?"

"What?" Shona's frown deepened.

"Huh?" Mace looked between the two. "The heck do you mean by that?"

Shigeru didn't answer, he just slowly turned around while raising a hand and waving it backwards at the group. Right after he did that, forty men three rows from the guys stood up and started slowly approaching the group.

Zachary blinked twice. "They're gonna fight us."

Zamasu almost scoffed. "Excuse me?"

"Oh for fucks sake." Jay leaned forward, turning around to tell all the masseuse women behind him to leave now, because things _might_ get violent.

Mace stood up. "Do you guys not have some sense of _decency_? This place is way too expensive to be taking mindless orders from some pube-stache guy."

Jay snorted, but Adrian got really serious. "Mace, I think you ought to dial down the sarcasm because… that guy fought Shona at one point."

"These guys look strong." Shona stood up, followed by everyone else.

"You know what this means, y'all." Zachary smirked, while he looked at the guys who nodded in full understanding. Zamasu gave the singer a look before moving backwards. The six men exited the inside of their group chair, three on one side and three on the other while the barrage of men were approaching them much faster. Without any hesitation, the first several men came at them all at once.

Shona took this initiation first; he rounded up the first man, who threw a punch at him only for Shona to block and flip the man over. Adrian dodged a flying kick with a swerve to the side and elbowed the adversary in the back, making him stumble back only to turn around and launch a barrage of attacks at Adrian. The producer near tanked almost everything before finally grabbing hold of a punch that was meant for his face, and pushing the hand to the side of him. He then kicked the guy in the back again before moving back to dodge an incoming knee from one of the men. Jay kicked the guy away before he could approach Adrian any further, and Shona sent a punch towards another baddie that was about to elbow Jay's face.

Mace was holding off two men at the same time. They both tried to punch him on either side of his face, and the director held both hands before flipping them both onto their own backs. Before any of them could even get up, the pair were blown back telekinetically by the Kaioshin's finger. Mace blinked and looked at him, while Zamasu teleported just in time to punch an adversary right before he could land a hit on Mace.

"You're welcome."

Mace snorted. "Thanks, God." He turned his back to Zamasu while Zamasu turned his back to Mace. "You mind tag teaming for a little while?"

"That's fine with me." Zamasu shrugged.

"Just don't overly tank everyone." Mace side-looked at him. "I'd like some credit too."

Zamasu chuckled, and they both looked on at the ten men who weren't running, but _launching_ themselves at the duo. Zamasu raised a hand and blew back half of the men while Mace moved forward to grab two men's collars, slamming them to the floor. While in a crouch position, he released the men and backflipped a kick right to another's chin, he flipped again to gain footing while Zamasu charged forward and held off a weak ass punch from this chubby guy with two fingers. He then kicked the man in the stomach, sending him flying across the room and slamming onto the wall. The Kaioshin turned around and held his palm in front of a guy running at him; it made contact with the male's face and made him face onto his back. Zamasu lifted him up with his mind and kicked him forward until he bowling pinned three men at once. Mace was behind Zamasu, taking down another male with ease as Zamasu held the back of a guy's collar as he tried to go at Mace. The Kaioshin simply threw the man behind him.

Jay slid past a man's open palm only to watch as another guy who was airborne literally bodybag the man trying to attack him. Jay turned to see Zamasu, already knowing it was the Kaioshin's doing. The producer held an arm in front of him keeping another one's palm at bay only for a moment, suddenly the man unleashed a ki blast in front of Jay's arm which made the previous Tourney winner jump backward before being blown away. He looked down at his forearm and back at the man, who now sent three small blasts Jay's way. Just as Jay was about to slap away the ki blasts, he received a heavy punch to the face and landed on the floor while the blasts themselves went to the wall behind him.

Jay turned around to see Shigeru, who was smirking down at him. "Don't think I don't anything about you, Mr. Teshima. Your family has quite an _interesting_ legacy."

"I never thought you didn't." Jay wiped his face with the back of his hand and stood up. "If you think being zealous over a victory you didn't have would get you anywhere, you're dead wrong."

"This goes far beyond a simple _victory_ , kid." Shigeru shook his head. "Our bloodlines deem us as arch nemeses. Are you aware of that?"

"I'm well aware of it." Jay clenched his fists before his ki flared up, and he flew towards Shigeru with one hand raised for a punch. Just before he'd hit him, Jay switched hands and Shigeru held off the attack in his palm, making the producer look up at him.

"Using your ki in such a nice place like this?" Shigeru shook his head, but then he sneered at Jay. "Don't mind if I join in." His ki flared up, and the palm that had Jay's fist built up with a ki blast that sent Jay back several feet. Shigeru let out a malicious laugh. " _You're supposed to be the World's Greatest_ by a mere trophy. I've been growing old, and yet you can't seem to touch m-"

Shona elbowed Shigeru in the stomach. The ki that built up in Shona's elbow drove Shigeru back several meters, just a several feet away from the wall behind him. The superactor charged at him with a single ki punch that threw Shigeru's back against the wall. He turned turned to Jay who had just approached Shona. "You doing alright?"

"Definitely." Jay smirked at him, and he evaded the kick of a random guy by ducking. Mace came right around the corner to attack the dude while Jay and Shona focused on Shigeru.

"You two are no match for what's coming up for you." Shigeru charged up a blast that competed with the lighting of the large masseuse room, making everyone else look back at the three previous Martial Arts contestants. Zamasu raised a brow at Shigeru before he finally let his ki blast go. "This is for you, Shona!" The blast went towards them outrageously fast, even Shona's eyes widened as he attempted to raise his forearms to block it. It was a quarter of the way away from both Jay and Shona when it was blasted away by a red laser beam-looking ki, hitting Shigeru's blast and near destroying it, which nearly destroyed the wall adjacent to them.

Zachary lowered his hand after letting the laser ki go, and Zamasu whipped his attention towards the singer. The Kaioshin glared at him. "You said you didn't try to master your ki control."

Zachary looked at him and shrugged. "Doesn't mean I haven't used it." There were twenty men, give or take, remaining after the six had dispatched of the others. Adrian and Jay both went off to dispose of the rest, and Shona took this time to help the musical duo as well. Mace secretly pressed a button on his watch minutes ago while they were fighting, and he looked at Shigeru who was glaring at Zachary.

"So you're able to dispose of my ki blasts?" Shigeru turned towards him. "Impressive. But not for long." At tremendous speed, Shigeru blasted himself towards Zachary who held up one arm to dodge whatever was coming at him. Zamasu punched Shigeru away from Zachary's line of view, sending the 2nd rate Martial Artist towards the wall and ultimately breaking it upon contact.

"Was that necessary, dude?" Zachary blinked at him.

"You would've got hurt if he hit you." Zamasu crossed his arms. "Your attempt to block him was weak."

"Hmm…" Zachary nodded. "What happened to all those 'I hate humans' mottos you told me about earlier today?"

"They're not going anywhere." Zamasu turned away from Zachary, who was smirking hella big at the Kaioshin. "Keep your eyes on your enemies next time."

"My eyes were on him though."

"Don't get smart with me." Zamasu sternly spoke, turning back to the singer who tilted his head with a smile. That little action randomly reminded him of Ambrose for some reason.

Zachary did a backflip to accommodate for the space one of the men were going to kick at. Zamasu kicked the guy away, and stood closer to the other five males, they all managed to stand in the circle with back to one another while looking at the enemies ahead of them. The first twenty that initially had half of them get back up, and these were the ones who were sending ki blasts all over the place, so now they were looking at close to thirty men again. Zachary zoomed forward, along with Jay and Mace as they played offensive, while Adrian sided with Jay as a defense, Mace went solo, Shona went to deal with Shigeru, and Zamasu was with Zachary. Jay sent a blast towards two males that hit one of them, while the other received a punch to the chest by Jay; Adrian swept a kick up a guy's chin while he was running towards Jay, who was dealing with a buff guy. Mace was smacking down a few guys on his own, while Zachary's acrobatics were leading him through with the fight alongside Zamasu to tag in with the singer.

Shona and Shigeru ended up in a different room after Shigeru was sent flying out of the massaging room; the two were going at it with barrages of kicks and punches in the separate empty room next to the one they were in before. The superactor held two fingers up, focusing ki on the both of his fingertip to sent it out at Shigeru. The man dodged it, rather counterattacked it with another one of his own ki blasts that looked like it hit Shona head on, and Shigeru smirked.

Shona held off the ki blast, that was about half his height in radius, keeping it in one hand. "You really think this would possibly stop me, Shigeru?"

Shigeru stood in shock; that was probably his strongest ki blast yet, and he had recently perfected the technique so that he could charge it up faster. And here was Shona, holding it above his _palm_. "How the-"

"You must've forgotten how much of a fight I put against you fifteen years ago." Shona's hands tensed before relaxing again, and Shigeru's yellow ki blast started to emit with orange reddish energy that ran through the formless sphere. Shona was _charging_ his own energy within Shigeru's blast!

He held his hand back with a slight smirk as Shigeru watched in pure shock. "Allow me to remind you of what you were up against." Shona then held his hand forward, and sent the blast flying at Shigeru. Shigeru held his arms up in an attempted to block it, but it was only an avail for a few seconds, pushing him back as the blast overtook him, exploding against the wall that divided the room together. Zamasu looked at the now open wall, and then down at Shigeru who was near unconscious from the ki blast.

The Kaioshin raised his brows; these people he was hanging with had _much more_ to them than he thought.

At this time, all forty men including Shigeru were down, and a bunch of police officers came just in time to carry all of the men out after they seen Mace give them the gesture to do so. Shona entered the room through the now opened wall just as the masseuse ladies slowly sauntered back in in horror at the messy sight. The dividing wall between this room and the next was _finished_ , some parts of the carpet were ripped, several chairs were ruined, the frames on the walls were dropped to the floors, and standing in the midst of this were six males who took down forty adversaries in a mere dozen minutes.

Zachary, Shona, Adrian, Mace, Jay, And Zamasu looked around at the damage that was caused, before Shona openly looked at the women with an apologetic smile. "I'll buy you a new room."

"I'm pitching in." Zachary raised a hand and looked at Shona. Pretty much of the six guys, the five of them opted to pay for the restorations of the room which the masseuses didn't have much a problem with because they're _rich_. Meanwhile Zamasu telekinetically picked up a bunch of decorations from the wall, placing them back where they used to be. He then raised a hand towards the wall, pulling and putting back all the walls pieces together, they finally glowed with a bit of white light before staying in place. Zamasu did the same with every portion of the room that was broken, all while the women looked on in shock and awe as well as they guys.

Once the room was completely cleared and cleaned, Zamasu lowered his hands casually. Everyone else blinked in pure shock at him while Zamasu gave them a plain look. "Done."

"Or, he could just do that instead." Mace looked around, actually trying to figure out if he was wasn't high on something over what he saw.

One of the masseuses nodded at the men, before each and every single one of them said a polite 'thank you'. The guys had paid the women, each apologizing for the disturbance even though they knew that it wasn't their fault, and bid them and the manager a kind farewell before leaving.

"Question." Mace raised a finger. "What _did_ he want? And why did he have a bunch of his people with him?"

"It was a setup."

They looked at Zamasu who was sitting alongside the others in their limo, with his arms cross and his eyes closed. Shona regarded the Kaioshin's statement, because he also believed that to be true.

"A setup?" Adrian frowned. "None of us have ever encountered anyone who could possibly put us through like that. Unless if they somehow _knew_ we were going to be here."

"But they weren't after Shona." Zachary said. "I think that Shigeru guy was going for someone else, but when he found Shona he just… thought that he'd kill two birds with one stone, I guess?"

"It looked like that to me." Zamasu opened his eyes again. "They must have connections with someone we know, someone we know must've told them where we were."

Adrian leaned back, while Jay's fists clenched and he silently frowned to himself. "But _who_ would tell us off like that to those people _?_ "

Thousands of miles away, several many hours before the men's fight, two people were sitting on a coffee table in one of the barista shops of West City. They calmly placed their coffee cup down, before looking at the individual before them.

"So a person you know is in Caplax?"

"Yes."

"And you think that he should be 'tampered with', as you had said?"

"I don't like him." The person across from the coffee drinker shook their head. "Find him, and _take care_ of _him_ while his group is away."

"Right, I think I could establish a thing over there." Another sip of coffee, before they nodded to themselves; this would put three more people on their group's list. Of course, this person he met knew what they were in for, apparently they knew a specific person in the group, and whatever they did was unforgivable. They pulled out a notepad and clicked their pen while looking at the other. "Give me more details, ma'am."

"Yes." She nodded, taking a sip of her green tea. "Know this; his name is James Desmond..."

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Y'all… these guys fought in silk** _ **robes.**_ **Keep that in mind.**

 **You would have thought we were gonna go a whole thirty chapters without some criminals getting involved with our lovely brodies?** _ **Ahem;**_ **Nope. And we finally get a chance to see just a bit of how strong everyone is (Zamasu is an obvious one, but Adrian, Jay, James, Mace, Zachary and Shona were ambiguous). It looks like James is being targeted as well as Terry and possibly Shona, what could this spell for the guys themselves?**

 **I wanna make one thing clear; self-defense is something that is taught in all public schools in this planet since it's deemed important. So even though James and Zachary are very rudimentary in terms of self-defense, Adrian, Jay and James are both well-versed in martial arts, as well as ki control. Shona is on another level compared to the others, a completely different league. There is a reason why he is the legendary martial arts actor. [Imagine if I can scale all the power levels of these guys, they'd be** _ **fodder**_ **compared to Zamasu, some of them XD]**

 **I think you could tell what type of continent the country of Caplax is based off of if you know the significance of the airport's name. There is an airport located in Casablanca, Morocco (Mohammed V International), just thought I'd throw that out there, huehue.**

 **Ethan made it to his interview on time, and he met his new boss finally. He can thank Zamasu for saving his ass later; matter of fact, there is a growing number of people who need to thank this God for what he's done inadvertently :3. But did you think Ethan's resume was reasonable for a job position like the one he has in Rose Corp? Hmm...**

 **The fact that Zamasu wants to explore says a lot about the way he's thinking right now. I guess you can say that he has a drastic** _ **change in perspective**_ **.**

 **Yes, that was a pun, yes I was hinting at a certain author's story. I'm straightforward with my shit.**

 **See yas on the next chapter!**


	29. Coming to Understand

**It hath returned. Hnn.**

 **:)**

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 **Beginning to Understand**

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Zamasu watched the clouds of the night sky move by slowly. Two days passed after that whole ordeal at the masseuse place; Everyone was asleep once again, and he didn't have any book to read nor did he feel like getting up to get one. But what he did feel like doing, was going back to Insula, that large forest where Ambrose lives. And that was going to be his main objective tonight, he could imagine it'd be several hours ahead of the time in Caplax, or early in the morning. He debated on whether or not such a time to go would be reasonable considering a human's normal sleep cycle (and yes, he was actually considering that), but he intuitively felt pulled to going there again. Zamasu opened the window to his suite room, feeling the breeze on his face. Unlike Tycho, the breeze was warmer while Tycho's weather was starting to get cooler, Zamasu's godly sense could determine the temperature discrimination very well.

Instead of just taking the easy way out and literally teleporting there, Zamasu decided to fly just so he could see the view of the cities and the ocean and the forest. He levitated out of the window and ascended upwards while moving the the right. He turned around, and flew forwards in that direction while slightly pivoting to the west of his sights. He was looking around the changing scenery, from the sandstone themes of Caplax to the thick forest of Tycho's upper natural green fortress, Insula. Zamasu saw the glimmering yellow sphere just hundred of feet away, and he zoomed forward while looking down at the area, before landing in front of this… weird looking house.

This wasn't Chandler's house, it was much bigger and _much_ more architecturally advanced; the floor and outside platform of the house were on a very short hill, and it seemed to curve upwards just like the hill did. It was a polished dark wooden color, and the walls of his home were not entirely made of glass. There were white stairs that led up to the front door which was a matte black color just like the curved rooftop of the structure. He also noticed that the rooftop wasn't painted over at all, if you could zoom in real close you'll notice that it had a fine grid structure, all for the purpose of capturing solar and other energy. Zamasu realized this was one of those self-sufficient homes, and he shouldn't have been surprised especially considering who this house belonged to.

The outside was well kempt, just like pretty much everywhere on this premise the grass was cut, and the plants were healthily grown around his home. Zamasu marveled at the natural beauty of this place, he could tell that Ambrose enjoyed and cherished nature just as much as he did. Zamasu leaned forward, not moving from his spot but trying to see if there were any lights on to indicate that the trillionaire was indeed there. The sun was just about to rise, so he figured that the lights would logically be off anyway. He didn't see anything moving in there either, so the Kaioshin turned around and looked out into the wondrous premise, his eyes running all over the place as he started taking slow yet gravitated steps to a certain area. Perhaps he can come back later and do what he's been wanting to do for quite a while now.

"Are you wandering around again?"

Zamasu whipped back around to see Ambrose leaning against his open front door. The Kaioshin could swear that he didn't _sense_ a presence near him, or in that house at _all_! This was different from say, Nousha; he could tell where she is because there's always this energy that happens to loom around her, and even with a normal human being like Rebecca he could tell when she was in her house and when she wasn't. But with this man, Zamasu did not sense his presence at all, and he wondered if it was due to some sort of tech involvement because lord knows what could be sitting beneath Zamasu's white boots.

He blinked, looking over Ambrose entirely; the trillionaire was wearing quite a casual yet rich looking outfit. It looked like a silken white robe-like jumpsuit that fit his body very well, and it complimented his free long hair and golden eyes. His side bangs ended just below his chin, making his hair look layered in a sense. Zamasu blinked. "Umm… I actually wanted to see you."

This made the trillionaire raise both his arched brows as he stepped out of his house. He left his door slightly open and went down the steps of his stairs to approach Zamasu. The closer Ambrose was getting to him, the _weirder_ Zamasu was feeling; those magnifying eyes didn't hold any sort of dirty intent, but the Kaioshin seemed to figure that there was something about this man that he couldn't put his finger on.

And it had nothing to do with his wealth.

"Well, I'm here." Ambrose was in front of him, Zamasu blinked as he raised both hands. "Good morning."

"Yes, umm…" Now, all of the sudden, every single question Zamasu could think of was wiped out of his mind. He had a systematic approach as to how he would interrogate this man and now he couldn't think of a single question.

"Is this going to take a while?"

The Kaioshin looked at Ambrose. "Perhaps."

"Then we should go inside. Come." Ambrose gestured with one finger, beckoning him to follow. Zamasu furrowed his brows, before walking with Ambrose into his strangely advanced architectural home. He stepped in, looking around the place and the first thing he was introduced to was a very healthy living room. The floor was a dark violet, almost black color, his furniture was mostly white, his sofa was a rounded, weird shape that didn't look like many of the sofas he's seen so far. It looked _insanely_ comfy though, like high-end bedding material, and the lighting in the room seemed to be from these eco-friendly rectangular indentations on the ceiling. There was this one particular decoration on the wall that looked like an illuminating crystal mounted against a mahogany frame. His house looked beautiful, like a breath of fresh air, coming home to such a scenery everyday would be way too much to ask for.

A fruity scent caught his nose, it was a mixture of berries and vanilla. In fact, the entire living room smelled like this, and it was originating from the kitchen which wasn't hidden by some wall, it was exposed to anyone who was in the living room. Ambrose turned his head to looked at Zamasu. "I was making something until you came, I don't want it to burn."

The Kaioshin furrowed a brow. "What are you making?" The scent wasn't overwhelming, but Zamasu would be damn lying if he said it didn't pique his curiosity.

"I think it's called a breakfast bubble up?" Ambrose's brow raised as his nose scrunched up in recalling the name. He looked cute. "It's made with berries and biscuits."

Zamasu could indeed smell the freshness in those berries despite this bubble up being in the oven. He could tell that Ambrose had picked out those berries straight from his own garden. "Could it be enough for two?" Ambrose lived by himself, in this giant miles-wide and long stretch of his acres. He wouldn't be surprised if Ambrose only cooked for himself.

Ambrose pushed back his long hair, Zamasu watched the free straight tresses cascade down to his upper rear. "This would be enough for _ten_." Golden eyes turned with a smile at the Kaioshin.

"Would you like to _share_?" The natural scent of the berries coupled with a flaky pastry aura was nearly making the Kaioshin's mouth water.

Ambrose frowned slightly before he cocked his head to the side with a smile. "Not really…" He clasped his hands together and leaned forward on his countertop with them folded, looking directly at Zamasu. "But since you're here, I'll give you some when it's finished."

 _How kind,_ Zamasu smirked. He sat down on the couch, instantly reclining back because _sweet Kami_ , this thing was soft as heck! He got really comfortable in this house already, watching the engineer pull out a pitcher from his fridge and placing it on his countertop, right into the rays of the sun. The pitcher had this black beverage that was topped with sliced lemons floating on its surface. He was moving around quite energetically but calmly, especially for someone who was awake at 6:50 in the morning, Zamasu did look at the holographic clock sitting on the coffee table. And speaking of which, his coffee table is one of the coolest things Zamasu had ever seen; it was made of glass, and underneath that glass was an abysmal pseudo ocean. Even its edges looked like the side view of the sea and the ground below it, it looked wonderful.

"Tell me about yourself." Ambrose didn't mind the silence, even though the Kaioshin was the one who wanted to ask him things. Zamasu's eyes were just wandering everywhere. He figured that it'd be nice to know something about the individual sitting on his couch. "I don't think I know your name."

Zamasu looked back at Ambrose, his back was turned to him as he was serving himself some of that beverage. "I am Zamasu."

"Zamasu?"

"Yes."

"Hmm." Ambrose nodded. "What species are you?"

"I'm a God." Zamasu affirmed. "A God of Creation, to be exact."

"Really?" Ambrose turned around. "How old are you?"

Zamasu didn't feel like stating the entire number, he just estimated. "I'm in the late three hundred fifty thousands."

"Wow." Golden eyes blinked a few times, before he tilted his head slightly. "You're young."

Zamasu cocked his neck back, and then he slowly turned back to Ambrose. " _Excuse you_?" He took a step forward from the counter top. "And who are _you_ to consider me as such? You're a baby compared to me."

Ambrose didn't take that offensively at all. "I just thought you were in your millions, or something. You said you were a God, correct?"

To be fair, he was an apprentice. "Well, I'm being trained in the position by my mentor, who is the God of Creation in this Universe."

"Hmm…" Ambrose nodded slowly. "So you're an apprentice?"

"Yes."

"That makes sense." The engineer smiled. "Is your mentor old?"

"He is." Zamasu leaned forward. "He'll resign soon, and soon meaning in a couple million years or less."

"You still have a long way to go then." Ambrose plopped down from his seat on the other countertop as he started walking around and towards Zamasu.

Zamasu felt the strange urge to move back but he didn't as Ambrose approached him. He can smell the faint, yet plentiful scent of citrus on the man. "It isn't really. What is a day to you is a minute for me."

"I figured, sort of." Golden eyes looked at grey, and grey pupils slightly diverted their gaze. "Time eludes me, constantly."

"What makes you say that?" Zamasu raised a brow.

Ambrose bent over to pick up a few books from his coffee table. "I sit in my lab room for thirty minutes, and apparently eight hours pass by."

Zamasu snorted quietly. "I assume that it's because of your stature on this entire planet. You seem to have a lot of work to do."

Ambrose shook his head. "Not really. I just get carried away." He walked right past the crystal mount, and went over to a portion of the wall that opened automatically, revealing this small room with two opposite book stands to which he sorted out the books quickly.

"What do you even do in there?" Zamasu raised a brow at the _book cellar_ that was hiding in plain sight. "Other than create very lethal chemicals to make intruders hallucinate."

"Listen, I didn't _think_ you would react like that." Ambrose leaned backwards so that Zamasu can see his head. "I'm sorry but… you don't just walk into a place like my lab."

"Okay, fine." Zamasu raised his hands. "I will admit, that was partially my fault."

"Partially?" Ambrose stepped out of the bookshelves and the sliding door closed, flush with and seamless to the wall.

"Maybe _most_ of it was my fault."

" _Most?_ " Ambrose smirked at him. "You teleported yourself into trouble, Zamasu."

The Kaioshin raised his finger. "Technically-"

"Ah-ah, there's nothing technical. All of it was your fault." Ambrose pointed at him, walking towards his couch and sitting down in front of Zamasu. _Is it me or is his skin glowing?_ "But to answer your question, I just come up with new technology and create stuff, basically."

That's the thing with geniuses, they are so accustomed to their own high level of thinking that they don't feel the need to explain themselves, so they describe their craft like it's nothing. "Does that include this house?"

"Almost all of it." Ambrose shifted to lean to his side. "Like, the roof, some of the decorations around here, the floors, walls; those kinda things."

"Decorations?" Zamasu raised a brow. "Do they serve some sort of purpose?"

He shook his head. "Not all of them." Zamasu blinked. "That giant crystal mounted on the wall is a detector." He pointed to the crystal that Zamasu earlier complimented on inwardly. "It opens the bookshelf room." Zamasu's eyes widened; _what type of sorcery…_ "It was long kept secret but, now you know, but don't try to go in there and steal any of my books."

"I wouldn't _steal_ them." Zamasu frowned. "Would you mind if I took one of them for entertainment purposes?"

Ambrose blinked at him. "Do you want to read hundreds of lines of codes for a certain gadget?"

Zamasu frowned. "That's what's in those books?"

"In most of them, yes." Ambrose nodded.

"Umm… I'm actually genuinely interested in what they look like." The Kaioshin watched this man's movement as he walked towards that same bookshelf cellar, that's what Zamasu chooses to call it from now on. Ambrose fished out an innocent looking green book that probably consisted of a good two hundred pages. The engineer handed him the book and Zamasu looked at the hardcover before opening it…

" _What language is this_?" The Kaioshin had a look of pure and utter confusion; first of all, Ambrose had _beautiful_ penmanship. Second of all, there were lines of varying length with… Words or something on them? Seriously, everything looked so alien to him, it was as if he were some middle schooler who randomly walked into an AB Calculus class.

Ambrose chuckled. The Kaioshin's scrunched up face was humorous to him. "Some of it is HDHL, and if I remember correctly, is EB. Those are programming languages."

"What is this for?" Zamasu blinked, gesturing to the intelligent parables before him. "I mean, all of _this_?"

"That's the hardware for my jet." Ambrose pointed. "What's written here is kind of outdated, though."

"You mean that red jet that was outside?" Zamasu looked at Ambrose incredulously; so that verifies Zamasu's initial thought of the jet being made by this man.

"Yup." Ambrose was answering him like this was something regarding the weather, he was very casual about showing Zamasu the inner workings to how his jet worked, even though Zamasu didn't understand a _lick_ of what was going on in each and every page he flipped to. The engineer stood up all of the sudden. "I think those bubble ups are ready, I'll be right back."

"How can you tell?" The Kaioshin frowned.

"I timed it." Ambrose looked back at him before kneeling down in front of his oven, away from Zamasu's line of view. Zamasu did not hear any bell or whatnot going off to signal that the bubble ups were ready, did Ambrose keep a mental note of the time or something? "If you're a God, then you probably have a reason for being here, right?"

"I do." Ambrose took both his and Zamasu's plates and went to the dining room, which wasn't connected to the kitchen, and motioned for Zamasu to come and sit with him. The dining room looked _highly_ tech savvy, the walls were chromatic white, and the dinner table was black but there were little lines and grooves inside of it that gave the table texture. The seats didn't even have chair legs; they were _floating_ on top of a superconductive black floor frame that surrounded both the table and the chairs.

Ambrose set Zamasu's plate down after his, right across from where the Kaioshin was sitting. "What is it?"

"I am here to… learn about mortals, and why they shouldn't be eradicated." Zamasu added that last part with a bit more emphasis than usual. Seeing as he is a God, anyone who heard him say such a thing would get noticeably or even a tiny bit scared at the implication.

But not Ambrose. He just frowned. "But you're a God of Creation." He blinked. "I don't think Creators are allowed to destroy things, unless if you can _create_ destruction. If that was the case, then ignore what I just said."

Zamasu blinked at Ambrose, this man wasn't afraid of him at all. It wasn't Zamasu's plan to scare Ambrose, but the idea of full human eradication didn't seem to frighten him. He even responded to him with the most _logical_ approach, as to which Zamasu's occupation would forbade him from destroying an entire species.

"Actually, given the power that I have, which surpasses anything _you_ could ever comprehend," Zamasu emphasized on the engineer. All Ambrose did was slightly raise a brow, "I can destroy an entire race if I wanted to. And it will be divinely justified, for mortals ruin and pollute the universe."

The engineer instantly saw the flaw in what Zamasu was saying. "Hmm." Ambrose forked a piece of his berry bubble up. Zamasu looked at his proper etiquette. "How would you go about doing that?"

This was actually the first time someone had ever asked him _how_ he would have ended the entire existence of mortals. Usually, they'd lecture him, or make fun of it because they couldn't take it seriously. The only few people that Zamasu somehow ended up seeing eye-to-eye with were the guys, although he didn't _outright_ say that he'd destroy the mortals. "What other way would there be?" Zamasu didn't catch the reason _why_ Ambrose asked that question. "I would kill them all. It would make the universe as beautiful as it should be, this world doesn't deserve such horrible _pests._ "

Those golden eyes were looking at him as he said that, and Zamasu suddenly found it hard to say anything further even though he normally would have. Ambrose slowly nodded, he was eating his breakfast pliantly while Zamasu went on his lukewarm tirade. "What of mortals makes you want to kill them?"

Zamasu frowned, but it subsided a moment later. Ambrose didn't even look offended, he was curious. "The way they _are_." He got annoyed at all the things he found out about the planet, as well as everything he had seen from being an apprentice. Watching civilizations rise and fall for no reason. "They kill, they humiliate, they can't help but _destroy_ everything that they can't handle."

"And because of this, you want to kill all of them off?"

Zamasu paused for a moment. Ambrose was casually eating the toasty bubble up while his head was tilted to the side at the Kaioshin inquisitively. He didn't even sound at least a tiny bit judgemental of Zamasu's mindset. "Why would you ask that? Do you not see what your own species does all the time?" Or was he simply too rich to care?

"I do." The contrast between the two was so vast it was almost comical. Ambrose placed his fork down. "But that way of solving your problem seems degenerative for you. Stooping down to our level to take us down wouldn't do anything progressive at all."

That was such a _brilliant_ point, even Zamasu stopped himself for a moment. But Zamasu was thinking emotionally, attached to the idea of a perfect world. "What do you mean for _me?_ It would make all life much easier, instead of watching all the suffering and the downfall of billions and billions."

"What life would be easier if there is none?"

Zamasu paused again; Ambrose seemed to be understanding this in a different way than Zamasu did. But the man wasn't trying to get him angry, he wanted to know why Zamasu thought that murdering murderous beings would bring the universe to salvation. Zamasu didn't really see that at first, but that last question was making him see. "Ours." Was his simple reply, and Ambrose raised both brows. "The _Gods_ , of course. Mortals have become failures at prospering, all they do is fight and kill."

Ambrose frowned. "Zamasu."

Zamasu instantly looked back at him, back at those golden irises. This was the first time he's heard Ambrose say his name, and for some reason Zamasu really liked the way it rolled off his tongue. But the engineer continued. "You're a God of Creation, I assume your job is to create things. If all the mortals and beings of the universe were to be gone and stay gone, what job would you have?"

Zamasu looked down at the table, and then back at Ambrose. He was patiently waiting for Zamasu's answer, but Zamasu was sort of stumped. He could've gone the emotional route and lashed out at Ambrose for being so stupid, but he _can't_ see this man as stupid, especially with the fact that Ambrose did more than just spare a glance at Zamasu's beliefs. He questioned them, challenged them even if that, he allowed Zamasu to exercise his testimony to ending everything in his universe.

And here he was, unable to answer such a question posed by an intelligent mortal who wasn't out to inferiorize him.

Ambrose noticed that he had gone quiet and subsided from anger. He smiled at Zamasu. "Did you even think this through?"

Zamasu caught the lighthearted tone and he looked up at Ambrose. _This man's smile was just as magnetic as his eyes._ He smirked. "Perhaps I _did_ , human."

Ambrose shook his head. "I don't think so." He pointed to the bubble up in front of Zamasu that was still warm but not burning hot. "Eat before it gets cold."

Zamasu was about to say something, but he decided that this tasty and fresh bubble up needed to be digested first. "Very well then." He took the fork and pressed it against the bubble up, watching the pastry-like breakfast fluff back up after his fork pierced through it. He placed it into his mouth and chewed-

" _This is so fresh_!" Zamasu stared down at the bubble up on its fancy plate as if it was some sort of alien from another universe. He took another bite, and another, just drowning in the berry and vanilla-esque taste and aroma that was still emitted from this _heavenly_ dish in front of him. Ambrose chuckled, and Zamasu looked up at him. "You have the _nerve_ to eat this so casually?"

"I make it a lot." Ambrose was about to say more but he realized Zamasu was too busy closing his eyes and having the biggest foodgasm possible. He started to laugh. "Geez, does it taste _that_ good?"

" _Yes."_ It's quite funny that Ambrose made such great tasting food, he gets to eat stuff of this caliber _everyday_. Zamasu looked back at him, with an impressed smile. Not only because of this food, but because of the short conversation he had with this man. "You're quite an intelligent person."

Ambrose blinked twice before furrowing a brow slightly. "What makes you say that?"

"Well-" Zamasu was about to answer, and then he realized that his compliment wasn't really a compliment because of this man's stature. Ambrose chuckled, and Zamasu just scoffed. "Just take the compliment."

"I already did." Ambrose stood up with his plate, which was now empty.

" _Sure._ " Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "How about a sign of _gratitude_ at least?"

"Sure." Ambrose repeated Zamasu's response while disappearing into the kitchen. He did it so smoothly, that Zamasu was actually sitting there waiting for the engineer to say 'Thank You'.

The Kaioshin realized this, and then he shook his head. "You humans are so ungrateful."

"Really?" Ambrose returned with a glass of that black beverage, and a captivating smirk on his stupid, handsome face.

" _Excuse me?"_

" _Okay, okay_." Ambrose raised his hands up once he placed his drink on the table. "Thank you, I appreciated it from the start. Happy now?"

"Quite." Was all Zamasu said, and Ambrose shook his head with a chuckle. Zamasu looked down at the glass in front of the engineer. "What is that?"

"Black Lemonade."

 _The heck?_ Lemons aren't black. "How in the world do you cultivate that?"

"It's lemonade mixed with stevia and active charcoal, hence why it's black." Ambrose took a sip of it, regardless of Zamasu's frown. "Do you want a glass?" Zamasu looked down at the lemonade before nodding; he was curious as to how this would taste. Ambrose brought him a glass of this black lemonade stuff and the Kaioshin drank it, enjoying its fresh taste once again. From what he could gather, Ambrose had a very healthy diet, that much could be shown from his face and especially his lean, toned barrel-chested physique.

"Any more questions you have for me?" Ambrose sat in his seat right in front of him, folding his hands together and propping them under his chin.

"Yes…" Zamasu gave him a calculated look for a mere second. "You're quite a known name, by pretty much everyone. How did you learn how to do all of _this_?"

Zamasu was gesturing to the entire house, as Ambrose did explain that he came up with its architecture and most of what's around this vicinity. "Hnn, it was all self-taught, honestly."

" _Self-taught?_ " Zamasu frowned, leaning forward with eyes widened. "You taught yourself?! How long?"

Ambrose smiled. "Ever since I was a toddler, pretty early on in my life." Zamasu's facial expression was indubious, there was _no way_ this young man could do all of this on his own. "What, you think that's an impossible feat?"

"Definitely." Zamasu went back into his seat. "You're a prodigy… like me."

"Like you?"

"Yes." Zamasu nodded. "I got into learning martial arts at very young age. From the different forms and techniques, to the control of ki," at the word ki, Ambrose's eyebrows slightly raised, "It all came quite naturally to me. I reckon that all of this comes naturally to you, too."

"It does!" Ambrose sat up. "There is a lot of things you could learn in less than three decades."

"Three decades?" Zamasu raised a brow, before it dawned on him. "You're only _thirty?!_ "

Ambrose blinked twice. "Yes?" The engineer smiled. "You thought I was younger or something?"

"I thought you were in your early twenties, I didn't think you'd be ten years older than that." Zamasu looked closely at Ambrose's facial features; nothing on his face signified any form of aging whatsoever. Does this man age backwards?

"Oh… wow." Ambrose chuckled. "That's flattering, but yes I am thirty years old."

Zamasu nodded while looking at him, there was so much more brewing under the Kaioshin's head to ask but he needed to interact with this man more in order to let those thoughts out. _Interesting…_ "Where are you living now? I don't know if you have a certain place to stay over the year."

"I'm living with this one woman, but she's traveling around the world for this exhibition of hers." He had a slightly spiteful attitude. "So I've been living with her friend for almost a month now."

Now that Zamasu thought about it, the month interval was nearly its end. He had around five or so more days until Irene is expected to dreadfully return, much to his dismay.

"Exhibition? Who is she?" Ambrose raised an inquisitive brow.

"Irene." He said, _eww;_ saying her name brought a bad aftertaste in his mouth. "She's an artist."

"Irene Viberly?" Ambrose's eyebrows raised, he already recognized the full name of the woman he was talking about. "You might have _quite_ the circle of people around you then, if you're living with such a popular artist."

"I hate her." Zamasu was outright with it. "But some of her friends are fine." In fact, those friends of her friends were the ones who fought alongside him like two days ago.

It was a fun battle, to be frank. Even if the guys were weak as heck.

"Is it just because of your hate for humans?" Ambrose smirked at Zamasu and he playfully scoffed.

" _Maybe_." Zamasu shot him a smile and Ambrose chuckled, knowing that the Kaioshin was being less uncomfortable around him. "But she's also ungrateful." Zamasu took a nice sip of his lemonade.

"You called me ungrateful a few minutes ago."

"That's _different_." Zamasu placed his glass back down. "I already know you're not ungrateful. With her, she's just… _ugh_."

"That's very intuitive." Ambrose let out a light laugh. "You probably haven't been here for a long time, and didn't have much of a chance to meet people at first. Watch, your perception of her will change."

He was _really_ wondering if Ambrose was either not human or just that much of an insane genius, because meeting people was literally all that he did while he moved in to Rebecca's home. Speaking of which, he should drop by later to go see her out of courtesy. The engineer knew that Zamasu just needed time, and he's only had one whole conversation with the Kaioshin.

"Don't wish such horrid things on me."

"I'm not." The engineer had a headband as a temporary bracelet, he took it off his wrist and started putting his long hair into a ponytail. Is it right for Zamasu to feel a _wee_ bit of hair envy? "You probably haven't sat her down or something. I've only seen her vicariously through media, but she looks like a sweetheart."

It's so weird to hear someone outright opinionate someone in a good way like that, and it was genuine. Zamasu pursed his lips and looked down at his lemonade. "Looks… can be deceiving."

"Sometimes." That was the engineer's response, and he wasn't wrong at all but Zamasu didn't know that. Ambrose inadvertently turned to the direction of a bell sound before the bell sound went off. He looked at Zamasu while getting up and leaving. "That might be Chandler. I know you've met him already, the yellow guy."

"You'd be correct." Zamasu can tell that Chandler and Ambrose were more of comrades than just cohorts in work. Moments later, the familiar voice that sounded extremely human was heard in Ambrose's living room, getting closer to where Zamasu was sitting.

"...and apparently, most of the syntax was backwards." Chandler took a glance at his own touchpad. "So I asked Avery if there was a problem with the database, and he couldn't figure it out-Oh." Chandler stopped when he saw Zamasu emerge from the dining room. "Well hello, haven't seen you in a while."

"Hello, Chandler." Zamasu greeted him, and the AI raised a brow.

"Did I give you my name?"

"You didn't, but a person who was affiliated with you did." Zamasu clarified, and Chandler silently pointed to Ambrose. "No, not him. His name is Mace."

" _Ohh, that_ guy." Chandler instantly recalled who the director was. "I wouldn't be surprised, how do you know of him?"

Zamasu gave him the simplest explanation possible. "This woman I live with is friends with Mace's cousin." Chandler furrowed a brow, and Zamasu continued. "I'm here for a temporary amount of time, a year to be exact. So I have to live with a certain person for that time."

"And you play a part in paying their rent?" Chandler blinked, his question was semi-dry humor.

"He's living with rich people." Ambrose chuckled, and Zamasu threw him a look; says the damn trillionaire who's pretty much made this entire premise his own and is rich beyond belief. "So I highly doubt that'd be his problem."

"Hmm." Chandler nodded. "Well, alright then. By the way, I'm sorry to interrupt you guy's tea party, but I have to steal Mr. Sarashina here." The AI tugged slightly on Ambrose's sleeve and gave him a dickhead smile.

"What is it…" When Ambrose knowingly caught whiff of Chandler's smirk, he straight faced with a brewing smirk of his own. "Are you serious? _Already?_ "

Apparently this was something that Zamasu didn't know about. Chandler nodded. "Yes. Already."

Ambrose sighed, before looking back at Zamasu with a tiny smile. All those questions that Zamasu previously had suddenly resurfaced themselves. "It was nice meeting you, for real this time." The engineer reached out to shake the God's hand and Zamasu took it. His hand was soft. "You should go home, I don't know if whoever you're living with is awake, but… don't worry them over being MIA." Chandler called Ambrose's name, the AI was in the living room. "Maybe we'll meet again sometime."

Oh hell, they'll definitely meet.

Chandler opened the door only to lean back and look at Zamasu. "Bye uhh, guy- I still don't know your name."

Both Ambrose and Zamasu spoke at the same time. "It's Zamasu."

The AI looked between the two. "Oh, okay. Bye Zamasu." Chandler did a quick wave before fully stepping out.

Ambrose looked back at the Kaioshin. "You do need to leave too, you know."

He was being modest when he said that. "I know. Farewell." Zamasu smirked slightly before giving him a slight wave, and he just teleported straight out of Ambrose's house back into another very familiar place, hearing the sound of two females talking to one another.

Rebecca invited June over to her house, they haven't had a chill out day in a while. "... Can't be serious right now; him? Of all people?"

"I never thought that he would do that!" June winded down from cracking up. "Like, he literally told me not to touch him!"

Rebecca shook her head. "Maybe if you weren't so pushy, he would have let you at _least_ let you do so." Then she chuckled playfully. "Idiot."

Zamasu was literally right by her stairway listening to this _snippet_ of a conversation, he recognized that voice as the one woman he was fucking supposed to ignore and avoid. What they were talking about sounded like his entire situation condensed into a laughing matter.

And that pissed him off greatly.

Zamasu stomped down the stairs, and gave Rebecca a death glare. The doctor and the writer turned in time to see his more than angry expression, and they both blinked. " _Good morning to you two."_

"Uhh…" Rebecca raised a brow. "Zamasu, how're you- aren't you supposed to-"

"I told you I'd teleport back here whenever I wanted to, human." He spat out the last word. "You think what she's saying is _funny?"_

June raised a brow in confusion. "What?"

What pissed him off even more is the fact that June was acting as though she never tried to grope his chest and things in a sexual manner. That actually happened, by the way. " _You know what, you wench!"_

Rebecca frowned, before slowly looking at June. "How could you have told him that story if it happened a couple of days ago?"

June was just as confused as Rebecca. "I never told him about the cake fight, I can't possibly do so anyway."

Zamasu's anger subsided momentarily, _cake fight_? "Wait… what?"

Rebecca raised a brow. "June was just talking about the one time her boyfriend and she were baking a cake, and they started fighting each other with the batter. Umm…" She crossed her arms. "Is there like… something wrong with that?"

Zamasu felt like a idiot suddenly, even with June's mint blue eyes mirroring the look Rebecca had on her face too. "No… no there isn't."

"Then why'd you lash out like that?" June blinked, and Zamasu's anger came swarming right the heck back.

" _Because_ of what _you_ did to me a few days ago!" The Kaioshin yelled at her.

"What do you mean?" Okay, it's quite alarming that Zamasu was seeing how this woman was slick enough to flat out deny her horny-fest that night he went to visit her, but it's even more alarming because from reading her facial expression and her body language, she genuinely looked confused.

And not as in her being a great liar, she seriously looked like she couldn't recall the event. Zamasu frowned, he even tapped into her thoughts for a moment, nothing in her head was showing any form of suspicion; did this woman have some sort of memory loss?

But he was still pissed nonetheless. "You know what you did, you wretched _filth_! I won't utter your actions because of how disgusting they were, you should be ashamed of yourself for even attempting to _touch_ me!"

June looked… genuinely confused, and really hurt by what he was saying. So Rebecca stepped in quick to defend her friend. "Zamasu, what the fuck are you talking about? Has spending time with James and them made you crazy or some shit?"

"You have no idea how promiscuous this woman sitting right next to you is." Zamasu closed his eyes and crossed his arms. "Having the nerve to grope me-"

"I never done anything like that to you!" June exclaimed. "When was this? When did I touch you?"

"When I went to your damned office, and wanted to ask questions on behalf of your book that you wrote. You can't tell you possibly forgotten about that."

Rebecca blinked. "She never done that to you!"

"What do _you_ know?" Zamasu shot a look at Rebecca. "Is there some _relative_ reason as to why you're defending _her_?" His underlying tone was regarding the things he was told about Rebecca, according to the guys themselves. But he wiped that away, because the thought of that coupled with the situation at hand would make him punch Rebecca's neck in.

That's literally all he wants to do nowadays; punch everyone's neck in.

"June is not the type of person to do that!"

"I seriously am not!" June looked really frantic because she didn't know what Zamasu was accusing her of, and Zamasu could see that clearer now. Maybe she does have horrible memory loss, or maybe she has a split personality that can't recall what the other is doing.

 _Or maybe she's just a lying wench trying to best him with weak and submissive pretexts…_ Zamasu rolled his eyes, unconvinced at her and Rebecca. "Fine then, perhaps you aren't, I don't believe you." And then he turned around. "I have somewhere to be, if I stay here any longer I'd be soured by the both of you, especially _you_." He pointed at June. "Don't sit here and think you can play dumb in front of a _God_ , the next time you decide to exact your primitive carnal desires on me, I will not hesitate in killing you." June looked _terrified_ , this was the first time someone has ever trembled under the notion of being killed by him. He took a few steps closer until he was bent over to look June square in the eyes. " _Got that?_ "

Even though June had no idea of what he was talking about, she still nodded violently because she didn't want to be killed.

"Good." Zamasu narrowed his eyes, and then turned around again while addressing the two with a simple 'Farewell' before teleporting out of Rebecca's house in front of them. Who would've thought that going from having an enlightening conversation with an engineer to confronting some fetishizing human being would happen _that_ quickly?

He ended up in his own suite room, sitting on his bed. It was in the morning still, and now he could hear the sounds of the guys in their own respective rooms and in the living room. Zamasu looked at his door, seeing the knob turn quickly before an individual popped into his room.

Zachary opened his room door and plopped himself right in with a bright smile. "Morning."

Zamasu shook his head. "You should _knock_ first, human."

"Oh, right." Zachary took a few steps back to the door while not leaving Zamasu's room, and he proceeded to knock. Then he hopped back to where he was and bowed respectfully. "Morrrrrning."

Zamasu's chuckled. "Good morning." He stood up from his bed right when James peeked his head into the room.

"Morning, you guys." James smiled, and Zachary and Zamasu returned the greeting.

"James," Zamasu looked at the basketball player. "May I speak with you for a moment?"

James blinked. "Uhh, yes? Is it private?"

"If it is, then I'm out." Zachary looked between the two before going to the door, and then suddenly turning around again. "Is it?"

"Actually, it is." Zamasu said, and Zachary nodded before walking out and closing Zamasu's room for behind him. There was a silence between the two for reasons the both of them knew.

Here's what happened; yesterday afternoon before James left to join his teammates in doing drills, he called his girlfriend and excused himself away from the others. Zamasu wasn't present when he left the group, so he was walking past James' room and basically; he said something, Irene said something, he said something else, and then they were arguing. Zamasu had only caught whiff of him raising his voice on the phone, but didn't pay attention to everything that he said, but now that James was alone with him he wanted to know what that was all about.

"I overheard you yelling at someone on the phone." The Kaioshin simply said, and James furrowed a brow.

"Yeah? What about it?" He sat down on one of the chairs in Zamasu's room.

"Was it Irene?"

James paused for a moment, before answering Zamasu. From the times they actually spent talking to each other, James found that he and Zamasu agreed on many different things. So if he were to be honest with Zamasu it wouldn't be much a problem. "It was Irene." He sighed. "It's just a thing that couples do, man. We fight, we argue, and then we hug and kiss right after."

"You sounded very annoyed with her." Now it was Zamasu's turn to sit in front of James. "Saying that she didn't seem to understand a certain situation of yours."

James didn't know if he should hold his tongue on this subject, he decided against it. "Well- okay, here's the thing; I love Irene, don't get me wrong, she's my girl, but there are things about this relationship that I don't like at all."

"And that is?"

"It seems sort of empty now. I dunno how to describe it." James shrugged. "I mean sure, we do have our cute moments where we romance, and sex is definitely a part of that whole thing, but… that's just about it."

If it weren't for the fact that he and James talk to each other now, Zamasu seriously wouldn't have expected someone like _James_ to ever be upset over a relationship that was mostly sexual. Even now, what James just revealed is shocking for that reason only. "What you're saying is that you two aren't even that close to begin with?"

"Close, but _not_ close, you know what I mean?"

"I understand." Zamasu nodded. "Why can't you just… find someone better then?"

"Geez, what kind words to use on my girlfriend, Z." James narrowed his eyes at Zamasu, and the Kaioshin shrugged.

"You shouldn't be surprised. I don't like her at all."

"I know you don't." James said. "But you see, it's not that easy to just out and leave someone, dude."

"How come?" Zamasu frowned. "You said your relationship was empty."

"It wasn't always like that." James shook his head. "If it were, I probably wouldn've been done like months ago, we haven't been dating for that long."

His divine common sense could now see the major insecurity Irene was holding back; she and James have not been dating for long, not even an entire year. It seems like James is the one who's more reflective on his interactions then his girlfriend. For some reason, he thought it was the other way around, even if Irene is very stupid. "What was it that she couldn't understand?"

"After this year's finals, I want to go see my grandaunt. I haven't talked to her since like three weeks ago and that was brief, and Irene is annoyed at me being MIA for quite a while." James looked down. "She's very sick, and no one is really there most of the time so… I go to like...visit her for a while." The basketball player felt weird telling someone else other than Adrian how he felt about things that were more of a personal nature. The words that came out of his mouth sounded very uncharacteristic of him, to show a weirdly soft side like this. But since Zamasu was quite old and old enough to access a situation better than most, he could push away that unfamiliar feeling for now.

Zamasu's brain somehow put two completely different ties together, because he had recalled an incident that he was in. "This grand aunt of yours is old, I presume. Is she… always lonely?"

" _That would be an understatement._ " James gave Zamasu a look. "She's been sick for quite a while, but none of my family members or her friends visit her."

"Does she have blue eyes?" Zamasu randomly asked.

"Huh?" James frowned. "Uhh… yes? How'd you guess that?"

 _So this may be the same person…_ that old woman he saw back when he himself went to the hospital. "I just… figured she had blue eyes."

James raised one brow, he had hazel but heterochromatic eyes, there was a tiny hint of blue in them but he didn't think Zamasu could guess that his grandaunt had blue eyes. But then again, dude's a God, he probably knows the color of James' draws.

That's not a thought that the basketball player wanted to entertain.

"Well, she does. And I wanted to go see her in place of going to where Irene is at right now, which is Efilia. But she doesn't seem to like the idea-"

"Go to your grandaunt." Zamasu was straightforward with the solution, even though it wasn't a solution because James decided on it previously. "Forget about her for the moment, I think your grandaunt should mean more to you."

"Okay, I'm not one for favoritism-"

"You're not?"

"Nope."

"Lies." Zamasu smirked at James.

"I _might_ be a little biased-"

" _Might?"_

"Zamasu, shush." James chuckled.

"Don't tell me what to do." The Kaioshin smirked before leaning back. "Why would barely anyone visit her?"

The lightheartedness James was feeling faded away quickly. "My family has a thing for holding grudges." When Zamasu furrowed his brows, James continued. "She did things at a young age that they could not forgive so… she was sort of disowned from the family."

"That's stupid." Zamasu crossed his arms. "Unless if she went out and killed her own relatives, then they shouldn't be holding grudges for that long."

"She didn't do that, she was just… mean or some shit. She didn't want to do the things that the females in our family stress, like having children or getting married, stuff like that."

"I commend her." Zamasu nodded. "There is too many humans on this planet as we speak."

"Uh, have you been looking into our planet's history?" James leaned forward. "There was a point where there was like twelve billion people on this planet, now it's barely above four, I think."

"I _know_ about that." Zamasu closed his eyes. "But four billion is still too much."

James chuckled. "For you, it might be."

Then, Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "You weren't even alive when the population was that high, you speak as if you were there to begin with!"

James shrugged. " _Yeah_ , but I was born during the Anarchy period. And there were more things that killed a lot of people other than the Seven Year War."

So that was another coined phrase to describe the Global Contention. "And those thing were?"

"Natural disasters." James said with a sort of quiet tone. For some reason, Zamasu can hear the sudden apprehension in his voice because said event was probably way too gruesome for him to mention. Judging from how James reverted back to his ordeal with his grandaunt, this would be something Zamasu would have to look up by himself. "But yeah, I told her I'd go see my grandaunt after the game, and she got annoyed with it, but you see…"

"Family means more." Zamasu plainly finished his sentence for him.

"Exactly." James clasped his hands together. "There wasn't even a problem involved, I already solved it anyway."

Zamasu's nodded. "I figured that, I was just curious." He liked the common ground he was sharing with the basketball player. The two exchanged smiles for a moment, before Zamasu's door opened again.

"You guysssss." Mace leaned forward with his hand on the doorknob. "We're gonna go play pool in like ten minutes."

"Pool?" James frowned. "It's 11 in the afternoon right now. Isn't it a little early?"

"There is _always_ time for pool." Jay overheard the conversation and leaned in with his cousin. "Besides, we'll hit up The Breaks beforehand, so if anything we won't be playing pool until the middle of the afternoon." The Breaks is a breakfast restaurant, similar to our iHops, except larger and less crowded.

James thought about it, and then he shrugged. "Either way, I'm still going. I have no drills right now, Zamasu you wanna come?"

The Kaioshin didn't know what pool was, but he was curious as to what it was. No doubt, one of the men will teach him how to play after they have eaten breakfast. "Sure." He stood up and went towards his own door right as Jay and Mace exited. James crossed his arms and looked downwards, feeling his phone vibrate twice in his pocket, but not pulling it out to check whatever message he'd gotten. The basketball player took a breath, and followed the others out of the large suite.

"I just got a message from Yellow." Bee looked at the embedded phone on his table, and looked back up at Rogue. They were both sitting in Rogue's house in the heavily AI-populated region of South City, which is basically where most of the superAIs reside save for Chandler. He, Bee, a few other cohorts like Amethyne, Genine, Kandrid, and others all lived here.

"What does it say?" Rogue was reclined into his own lounge room sofa.

"He wants all of us to meet him about a month from now." Bee summarized the two-sentences that Chandler had sent him, one of which was not particularly nice to read and said 'Including the Red one' with a very obvious grain of salt. "Geez, talk about a salty relay…" He muttered to himself.

Because of the long history they shared, along with their core programming, Bee and Rogue and Chandler's relationship is akin to that of a technological rivalry. Both Rogue and Chandler can't go through one conversation without insulting or being shady with one another, and Bee's sarcastic ass is just that; _sarcastic_.

Rogue made this mock-snort noise. "Looks like the construction worker actually has time on his hands to talk to others." His comment was jabbing at the fact that Chandler always wears this yellow, construction worker looking hat.

"I wouldn't deem that a surprise." Bee shrugged, before flying his way to stand on the armrest next to Rogue. "I'll have to call Ambrose as well to tell about this too. We already know what it's about."

Despite the frenemy relationship they had, every AI and their non-existent mother respected the hell out of Ambrose. He was one of the leading scientists who came up with the genius idea of letting go of certain protocols within many of their programming, which is why they all communicate and live advanced civilizations. The portions of South City inhabited by many AIs look like insane post-future city-states with accessible technology for them and pretty much anyone, because they don't see the need to hide such nifty things from the masses.

Rogue nodded. "I'll let the others know too." The red AI pulled up a holographic screen, quickly looking through all the notifications he received. One of them included new conclusive research on behalf of a case involving a single group of organized criminals. Some members were arrested, but many members of the group were now in Caplax. The particular messages also said that these criminals had an actual combination case that needed to be unlocked. "We've got another one." Rogue stood up and closed the hologram, tossing a key card over to Bee who caught it with his tiny claws. "They're gonna need some help with opening a case."

" _Again?"_ Bee's slitted eyes made the notion of widening. "They just love playing around with riddles, don't they?" This was the _fifth_ time they needed to crack another puzzle this week.

"It won't take long, we get those thingies done in minutes." Rogue stepped into his car, and Bee flew his way into the window to stand on the front view of Rogue's car. "Apparently, they also ran into some random little girl in the outskirts." Bee gave him a look. "I know this because I have a picture of a bracelet that… I guess belongs to the little girl? For some reason, one of the culprits threw it at the cops once they arrested them."

Bee made a notion of frowning. "That's weird… why would they only take a little girl's bracelet?"

The small child took very careful steps as she hopped into each rock poking its tiny head out of the pond. Silver chestnut-brown eyes smiled down at the small ripples the water made, watching the little fish wriggle through the water. A black and gold frog landed in front of her as she continued her trek to the other side of the pond, and she bent down to give it a sweet tap on its head. Alma, when she finally touched base with the dirt ground, picked up a small green rock and threw it into the pond, watching as it bounced from the buoyancy of the water's surface. Young, and chubby cheeks perked up with a giant smile, she appreciated the simplicity of nature.

An abrupt sound of a car was heard, it would be hard to pick up for someone who's spent their life in noise polluted places, but Alma picked up the sound quickly. Then, she heard metallic sounding clicks, and rapid boots scampering through the ground.

"There you are…"

She turned directly to where that voice was, even though the person was trying to hide themselves in order to scare her. Alma didn't say anything, but the person slowly came out from the trees. Right after he did, three more people emerged, all of them armed with a weapon.

"You're not supposed to be out here, kid." The first male gave her a mischievous smirk. "It's not safe to be frolicking around."

"I'm sorry." Alma blinked, but sincerely apologized because she didn't know that this place was prohibited from loitering. Except it wasn't. "I can leave now-"

"You don't need to."

The second man cut her off, and he sheathed his knife. He looked at her with open arms. "Come with us."

Alma frowned. "...no…" She slowly shook her head.

"Don't you think this place would get you into danger? Where's your _mommy?_ " The third male stressed the last word. Alma blinked.

"I've been fine. I can leave if you want me to." She already knew these people meant nothing but trouble, but the calmness she was exhibiting was pushing the men to further try and put fear into her.

"That's not gonna cut it, kid." The third, and biggest one of the three stepped forward, towering over Alma's tiny form even though he was fifteen feet away from her. He looked at the other men, gave them the signal they knew, and they followed suit. "We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the _hard_ way." He clasped the club in his strong hands with a smile. "Your choice, kid."

Alma looked between the three, they were all getting closer by the second.

Alma didn't give them a response, all three of them stopped when they were less than several feet from her. Instead, she stood still, looked at where their feet and arms were, and then tilted her head.

Tiny fingers loosened and she didn't see a reason to be afraid; she had already _made_ their decision...

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Ambrose and Zamasu had quite the interesting conversation, I did alluded a little bit to what Zamasu did in the anime, where he took Goku's body to exact his eradication. That was alluded when Ambrose said 'unless you can create destruction'.** _ **Ahem**_ **.**

 **Just to say here that HDHL is actually a play on Verilog or VDHL, and EB is a play on VB, which are actual coding languages. I know this because I'm a programmer, don't judge my** **geekdom** **xD.**

 **And also, James still loves his girlfriend, don't get him wrong; but he feels and mirrors that exact same sentiment as Rebecca and Zamasu. This is the one similarity that ends up bringing them closer, and it might lead to something very unexpected.**

 **No,** _ **don't you dare**_ **think another ship is going to be developed between Zamasu and him, that is never going to happen. I'm being serious.**

 **It's about time that you ought to play close attention to the job title Ambrose has; he's a superintelligent rich** _ **engineer**_ **, engineers have the job title of creating and designing new machines, builds and whatnot. I won't reveal more because we just got started with him talking to Zamasu, and this has been symbolized in the past few chapters.**

 **Ahh yes… A cliffhanger, I'm sorry kind of. Looks like Alma has two choices; she can either go with those ominous men, or run away from them to save herself. What will she do? Find out on the next c- oh my fuck, I sound like every ending to a DBZ episode. I'll shush, see yas on the next chapter!**


	30. Guess Who's Back

**Quick thingie here: the Bee and Rogue convo happened two days after Zamasu talked with Ambrose. Right now, he and the crew are in James' big game. All I gotta say is…**

 _ **Return of the Mac…**_

 **Please tell me you get that reference, that's one of the best commercials out there xD.** _ **Merry Christmas friggin' Eve, or day, whenever you see this, huehue.**_

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Guess Who's Back**

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"So you wanna go the hard way, huh?" The big guy stepped forward. "Alright then…" he looked downwards, before charging at Alma with the club on his hand. He swung right before Alma ducked, and the force made him slightly lose his balance. She then extended her leg against the ground in front of his raised foot, making him trip and look like an idiot.

The second one came at her in full force. He exchanged one blow that would've rendered her unconscious, but Alma held his punch with a palm while standing to the side, so that his fist's momentum would not injure her, and so that he can stumble forwards from her dodge.

He turned around and attempted to swing as he did so but Alma crouched, and sprang back a safe distance from the male. Her back bumped the first man's thigh, and she looked up to see him pointing a gun right at her face.

The seven year old grew up in a very eccentric family; her father was very physically fit, and he would teach her some forms of self defense in his free time. Her mother was close with her for the first three years of her life, she was very philosophical, encouraging the young child to read and learn whatever she wanted as she grew up which… honestly became her motto ever since. She's carried that knowledge, along with a few other esoteric things, even up to know as a seven year old. Her relatives were also well versed in self defense, so as she looked at the gun in front of her, she watched the twitch of his finger, and she watched him pull the trigger.

The first guy damn near gasped in utter shock because this little girl's head swerved away from his pistol at _point blank range_ , and the man with the club came up to knock her out cold only to hit his cohort right in the gut.

"Fuck!" The big dude yelled out, while Alma was several safe feet away from them. Silver chestnut eyes looked at the two next to each other, before the second man ran at her while tossing a knife up in the air. She looked up at the knife, and then held her arms up to block his punch. Her hands were not big enough to block his attack head-on, and she was pushed back by his force. The knife thrown up in the air was descending right into his other hand, ready for him to catch.

Alma crouched quickly, before propelling herself upwards into a backflip and landing just a few feet from where she was. The girl grunted at the feeling of pain on her upper arm and looked down to see a small, barely bleeding cut against her skin.

It didn't make sense to them as to how Alma was so quick to dodge and maneuver through every single one of their attacks. She had grabbed hold of the biggest dude in the group's forearm, and proceeded to quickly flip him so that his back would hit the ground. Soon after that, the fallen man looked up to see one of his guys fly right past his line of view, rolling a few times on the dirt. The last of them attempted to kick Alma but she dodged again, turning to his side and pushing the man into the pond with her foot.

The big guy with club was still on the ground, looking at Alma who was just standing there for a moment before she backed up and started walking away. One of his men attempted to get up and grab his pistol on the ground, but he checked the action immediately. "Don't."

The cohort looked down at him, the club man was slowly standing. "Let her go, the both of you. We'll report back to Judenov about this, she's not normal."

"Right." The cohort nodded and they both looked over at the pond. Alma was still in the vicinity, so she had also realized that the guy she threw in there wasn't making any signs of returning back to the surface. Suddenly, the three saw the surface of the water move before man emerged frantically trying to catch his breath.

"Oh shit- can he swim?" The cohort looked at the big guy.

"Does it _look_ like he can?" The club man narrowed his eyes. Alma blinked, seeing the man still struggling to breathe, but his own mates were taking too long to get him. So she ran forward and hopped in right when the helpless man was about to give up. Both the man and his cohort looked on in weird shock, as Alma came back up pulling the other guy out of the water and placing him onto the ground. He was still conscious, and he blinked multiple times because apparently the person he tried to shoot just minutes ago had rescued him from drowning.

Alma looked down at her already worn clothes which were now wet, and then she stood back up as the dampened guy stumbled to sit up as well.

"Why the heck did you do that?" He looked at the little girl, being the only one of the three to actually say something about her action.

Alma looked down at him. "Because you were drowning."

Her simple answer made the other men blink in confusion. Alma walked away, finally leaving again, and the big club man shook his head in disbelief. _We'll get her later, when we have more than enough people to take her down. "_ Boys _."_

The two looked at their commander, and he closed his eyes. "We gotta go back. We'll retrieve her later." The cohort raised a brow, while the damp man looked over at where Alma walked off to before standing up with his face downcast.

{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}

Merkel raised a brow at the man sitting in front of him. "So that's what happened?"

"Yes." The clothing that he had been wearing was slightly dry from nearly drowning in a lake, and also cold because he was in an air conditioned room. He told Merkel everything, except for the part where she saved him. "I didn't think she'd be that good at self defense."

"Well, obviously she is." Another voice entered the room, it was a female semi metallic sounding voice, and the two turned to see her standing by the door. This woman was white, had dazzling blue and brown heterochromatic eyes, long jet black hair and was wearing her usual attire; a trenchcoat with a bodysuit underneath, the collar covering her mechanical neck up until it reached her chin, which was also metal. "She's been around long enough for her father to teach her a thing or two about martial arts. You," she was talking to the man in front of Merkel, "ended up underestimating her. Don't ever do that again."

Merkel frowned. "So what, are we supposed to go there with a whole fleet of men to get her ass?" He raised his arms. "Do we need a plan M, Andrea?"

"No." The woman, known as Andrea, shook her head. "We do what we do best; wait it out." She closed her eyes. "Seek her when the time is right, and right now is not the time to bring her here. It's that simple."

"I understand." Merkel nodded after a pause, and his blinking watch started to beep. He then returned his gaze back to Andrea. "There are new transactions happening outside of the globe. I think I gotta go in for this."

"I already know of them." Andrea approached the man sitting while Merkel walked past her. "But go now, that stuff get bidded way too fast." Merkel exited the darkened room and Andrea turned to the dampened man who was still sitting, looking pensive. "What bothers you, Evan?"

Evan knew the reason as to why Andrea knew so much about Alma, so he didn't really need to hold off what he was thinking about. He gave her the entire story "I was drowning, we were near the lake and she kicked me in there, only to pull me out right after."

Blue eyes softened. "She saved you?"

"Yes." Evan leaned forward, almost slumping.

"And this is why you've been silent all day?"

A pause. "Kind of…" His gaze was downcast.

Andrea understood why Evan specifically told her this information. Her head tilted slightly in regards to Alma's action. "That's not something new. Alma is a child, a smart one in fact." She closed her eyes, and turned around to walk out of the room. "It would go against who she is if she left you there just because you tried to shoot her."

She abruptly turned around and looked at him. "You'll join the others in the next heist. Meanwhile, Merkel will be in Frey, their exchange would last for two days on one of the platoon ships."

"So he's leaving the planet?"

"Yes." Andrea nodded. "I'll find someone to fill in for his place. We're racking up just about enough to expel the others, it won't take long until we'll be at full force."

Evan watched as she exited the room, her words running through his head, and he truly wondered if the motives behind capturing this little girl were what Andrea said they were.

€•€•€•€•€•€•€•€•€•€

"Wait, how come you won't just create food so that you can eat it whenever you want?" Jay looked at Zamasu.

"Because if I did, I'd be fat."

His unexpected response made the guys laugh. Mace frowned. "Can gods even gain weight?"

"I don't know, but I'm not testing that theory." Zamasu smirked downwards.

"You got a lot of self control. I'd hella drown myself in food with that power." Mace shrugged at the look he got from Jay. "It's a _useful_ need."

Adrian came back with another bag of chips, and Jay rolled his eyes. "Are you gonna keep eating everything?"

"Hey, hey… _chill down._ " Adrian gestured towards his friend. "You act as though I live like a tub of lard."

" _Yeah_ , but stop eating so much." Jay crossed his arms.

"You're not my girlfriend." Adrian casually tossed a chip into his mouth, and Mace turned around at the wrong moment, like an asshole.

"He might as well be." The cousin of Jay gave him a smirk, and Jay nearly threw his bag at Mace.

"Are you guys done?" Zachary was still next to Zamasu with his arms crossed. The both of them along with Shona were on the bleachers above Adrian, Jay, and Mace. James was of course playing alongside his teammates.

"Yep." Adrian turned around to smile at Zachary, and Zamasu shook his head at Adrian. "Zamasu you should _not_ be judging me."

"Who said I was judging you?" The Kaioshin gave him the same dickheaded smile that Adrian does.

"You're a God, and Gods tend to judge." Shona calmly raised his hand in a humble manner, and Zamasu chuckled.

"Well, not now." Right now, he was looking at the game itself, understanding how these humans were tossing a ball at, around and ahead of each other. James in particular happened to be quite… Exceptional in his movement. In fact, to say that this man wasn't good at what he was doing would be an understatement. His team, dubbed the Ty Warriors, was winning by two points, and this was the last third of the game (this planet's basketball games are three 'quarters' instead of four). The crowd was making some noise for every shot thrown into the basket, and the lights around the entire playfield started to change their hue. Truthfully, in our world the entire court would have looked much too futuristic with all the lights and how insanely clean it looked, and Zamasu found it quite nifty.

"COME ON, WARRIORS!" Some random girl screamed, she was about three rows ahead of Zamasu and Zachary. In fact, many of the people started to shout out 'WARRRRRRIORS' repeatedly with a pseudo beat, amping the energy up for both teams, and right now the opposing team was tied with the Warriors.

There was only fifteen seconds remaining, James skirted through taking the offense this time and he watched as his fellow teammate, Nick, had the ball under his palms. He dribbled, and noticed that the shot from here was way too far for someone like him to execute, and James saw this quickly. There were two people in front of him, and James went over to stand in the middle of Nick's view. Nick bounced passed the ball to James, and the following basketball player turned around once he took hold of the ball. There was only eight seconds on the clock.

He dribbled through and past every single opponent with much ease, quick sleight of hand skills going hand in hand with his view of the basket, five seconds were left.

He approached the underside of the basketball, and jumped at four seconds. His arm went back with the ball in hand, he was airborne with an Olympic style posture at three. His arm raised, aiming directly at slamming the basket with the ball at two.

Everyone went silent in between the interval of two and one seconds, including Zamasu who even leaned forward with the sudden suspense.

James slam dunked the ball straight into the basket, and once his feet hit the ground again, the buzzer went off.

Everyone, James' squad, and his teammates roared in victorious hype as the Ty Warriors claimed victory for the fifth time in the biggest season of the year. Zamasu watched as Zachary shot up with the others and they all yelled out ecstatically, but since he didn't know what to do, he almost stood up and clapped like this was an orchestra.

"The Warriors _hath done it again_!" The announcer's sense of humor played on the battle quote that the Warriors always had, which was them 'having doneth it again'. "James Desmond, scoring the final point, securing the win of the Ty Warriors. What an epic game we had tonight, this victory will solidify the name of basketball for decades to come."

Then, the large screens showed an amazing shot of James in the air with the ball in one hand. Whatever filter they used for this particular picture made the entire scene look heroic, as the young aspiring kids stood up with their banners looking at the victor of his team. James was being carried by his bros as everyone chanted his and the Warriors' name, and his human friends got up to go and congratulate the Warriors as well. Even the opposing team was shown love as well, for everyone knows that this entire event was just that;; a simple event. Zamasu chose to stay back and sit because he sort of didn't want to be in that limelight at the moment.

Once that was over the mic was handed to him to give that special speech. James was one of the younger members of the Warriors but he has made a hefty name of himself in the small amount of time that he's been with the crew.

He smiled up at the camera, his face and body were really sweaty, and everyone could see that in the large screens. Zamasu at first didn't think of listening to the entire speech, until a specific part of it caught Zamasu's attention.

"... We worked really hard to get where we're at, as individuals, as a team. Some of us have many stories to tell, and of course I got _quite a few_ ," this made the audience chuckle, "But many of us have been struggling for the most part long before this event, with health issues, family issues, you name it. Of course, all of that passes as it should, and it's hard to think of it that way when it is still happening. There are people out there- and in here, you guys, the audience- who definitely know what I'm talking about. They stop us, they halt us for a moment, but they would never stop us from becoming our best version..."

It sounds like any regular motivational speech, but to Zamasu, it was a callback to the situation with his grandaunt. From what James told him, his grandaunt heavily supported his choice in career, much like his entire family. But she was the one who was ill, that may be have been the roadblock James was mentally going through. Something told the Kaioshin that James was actually debating on forfeiting earlier, just to see if his grandaunt was okay, and that made this grit-filled speech even more enlightening, in terms of what Zamasu thought of this man.

"...I have a relative that's ill at the moment, and she's always been right up there in the bleachers back in highschool when I was in the Varsity leagues. For years now, she hasn't gotten the chance to come here and actually see me, but I know she's watching me right now." James pointed at the camera with a sweet smile as if she was indeed right there. James said this specific quote because it was something that he and his grandaunt say to each other back then as an inside joke thing. " _Shout out to ya_."

The audience cheered at the heartwarming speech that James just gave. Zamasu looked down at the ground, before looking around him. Everyone was focused on what James was saying, so he took this time to actually do what James wanted to do. He teleported out of the stadium, and ended up in the same hospital that he was once accidentally in. The same room that was completely white and empty, void of barely any color and life, but the old woman laying on her white hospital bed wasn't as dull as the room around her.

Zamasu didn't think she had the strength to actually sit up, but she did. Blue eyes were glued to the screen with a huge and proud smile on her face, probably the biggest amount of emotion he ever saw on her. She also had a box of tissues in her lap because she was crying before Zamasu teleported into the room, and speaking of which…She isn't aware of the fact that he was here. The Kaioshin took a few more steps, and that was when she actually saw him and jumped.

"You scared me!" She chuckled lightly while still keeping that bright smile on her face. Zamasu never seen such light in an elder person before, and it reminded him of Gowasu and how he's so old and yet has the energy of a young person sometimes.

"I apologise." He went to sit on the seat that he previously sat in before. It was cold. "You look really happy."

It was an obvious statement, but he genuinely was surprised to see this from her. She nodded. "Yes, I was just watching this entire game and knowing that it was my grand nephew who was playing, I can't help but smile." She looked down at the box of tissues, and then placed them on the side table next to her bed. It took her a long time to do so, her arms were quite shaky, but she did it anyways. "I know he worries about me a lot, this is the first time he's said something about me."

That goes to show how worried he really was, worried enough to project his wonderment of his grandaunt's wellbeing into a speech. "He was worried about you, him not being here during the week made him anxious."

James' grandaunt nodded, before she blinked. "Wait… you've met him before?"

"I am well affiliated with him and his friends, and was at the game; a few days ago he told me about how tongue-tied he was over not seeing you." The Kaioshin noticed how her eyes seemed to glow, a magnificent spark was going through them at the moment. He smiled. "I came here to see for him if you're okay."

She almost looked like she was going to cry, knowing that the God before her would send her message to her grand nephew. "...I am, I am okay." She nodded adamantly. "...Thank you."

Calm grey eyes softened. "No problem." Zamasu looked back at the screen, James had just finished the speech, of course he did give a shout out to everyone including his girlfriend. At this moment, the crowd was cheering loudly as he got off the podium and Zamasu stood up before looking down at the old woman. "I got to go back."

She looked up at him. "I'm sure he'll be wondering how you left that place so fast." Then she frowned. "How did you leave, though?"

"I can teleport." Zamasu said, and the woman recalled how he teleported into her room the first time around three weeks ago. "It's nigh instantaneous."

"Can all of your species do that?" She furrowed a brow.

"We can. It's a divine birthright of ours." It most definitely _is_ , the Shinjin race were born with magical capabilities. Zamasu would know of no other race blessed with such abilities. "We are Gods, in fact."

"You're from a race of Gods?!" She exclaimed, and considering the fact that he could teleport, and the situation with James at hand, she was too stoked to be skeptical. "So your race is all green?"

"No…" Cue the _friendly_ reminder of Irene's _kind monikers_ that make Zamasu smile. "We aren't all green. When we're born, our skin color is different but we are the same race regardless."

"Oh…" She slowly nodded. "That's a good mindset. You guys don't separate each other because of that stuff. It's only recently we started doing that."

"Recently?"

"Well, we did before the Seven Years." She was referring to the war. "From what my mother told me, people didn't discriminate that much but they did label each other all the time. That kind of thing was going on for too long, and it sparked the war. I was only a child at the time…" She paused momentarily. "Do you know about the war?"

"I've read about it, yes." Zamasu slowly sat back down. Maybe… maybe his return could wait. "And humans were too busy hating each other to notice that their actions would lead to many people dying?"

"Well, that's-" She stopped for a moment to sort of chuckle, but not in a mean way. "-that's kind of what history is all about. I'm afraid a majority of history was war and death and illness, but I'm seeing the world make an amazing turnaround over the past 40 years."

How sad, somehow it's quite an eye-opener to hear about an event in the past from an elder person, even if Zamasu is _many times_ older than this woman. Especially considering how old she hinted to be, which could be in her mid to late 80s or even early 90s; that meant she lived through the war, the Anarchy Period, the Technological Renaissance, up to now… _that_ is quite a story to tell.

"I think you should go now." The elder woman smiled at him. "My grand nephew's probably worried, please don't stress his heart."

That was meant to be lighthearted and playful, Zamasu chuckled. "I won't. But I'll tell him that you're okay. At least he'll get the confirmation without stretching his leg any further." That means, having to fly back to Tycho after his big game.

"Thank you again, it really means… a lot." She looked down, a warm smile arises on her face. It's been quite a long time since another person has something so nice, and with the little she has left in life, anything regarding James was something to be grateful for.

"You're welcome." He was turned around, but he looked back at her to smile. Her wrinkly smile was endearing, again it reminded him of Gowasu and how he smiled. Maybe he had a soft spot for old people just because of that, but truthfully...seeing this old woman smile brought a warm feeling out of him as well. The compassion she felt for James was… something.

He teleported while his gaze was downcast, a lingering thought about Gowasu before he was placed back onto the seat that he was once in.

People were leaving since the event was over, and the only person who noticed that Zamasu legit teleported right into his seat at the exact moment was Shona. The actor raised a brow, and Zamasu shrugged at him. "Something happened."

"What was it?" Shona frowned.

"Just something. It's confidential." The Kaioshin held his tongue as the others came back, and he instantly heard the two cousins of the group arguing, Adrian and James were chatting with one another, while Zachary was chewing on a candy apple.

"'Ey." The singer took another bite of the caramel-glazed apple. He was about to speak but paused just to chew even further. "This shit good, bro."

"I can tell." Zamasu raised a brow. "What is that?"

"It's a caramel apple." Zachary moved his ponytail over to the side. "The apple is green, by the way."

"...What's that supposed to mean?"

"I just _saying_ that it's green." Zachary shrugged with a smirk. "You know, sour and stuff like that."

Zamasu blinked twice before shaking his head. "I hate you."

"No, you don't."

He's right.

"You guysssss." Adrian waved his hand over at the dudes. "We got a limo ride waiting."

"Where's the trophy?" Jay looked ahead of Mace and at his best friend.

"It's gonna go in the altar of the team's building." James said. He then held the front of his shirt and kept shaking it to fan the front of his face with a chuckle. "I'm still sweaty."

"James." Zamasu called out the basketball player, and motioned for him to come closer. The guys had agreed to hold up the limo while the two talked and left them alone to chat.

"What's up?"

The Kaioshin kept his shoulders straight. "She's told me she was okay."

James furrowed a brow. "What?"

"Your grandaunt." He said.

James' eyes widened. " _How the fuck…_ "

"While you were giving your speech," Zamasu's lips curled upwards, "I teleported into her hospital room and spoke with her briefly. She wants you to know that she is okay."

Would it be fair to say that James kinda forgot Zamasu has extraordinary powers? He wouldn't think that Zamasu would do something as noble as _that_ , even though they became amicable for a short amount of time. "She was watching the game, wasn't she?"

"She was." Zamasu nodded. "And she's proud of you."

A tiny, rare smile came across James' face. He looked down and then back at the Kaioshin before nodding. "Thanks, bro."

"No problem." That made Zamasu a little happy, to see a young guy like James smile like that. He had a heart, and Zamasu knew it as well. The last thing either of them would want is danger for the other. In a light hearted moment, Zamasu chuckled softly. "We probably should go to the others now."

"Right." James did so with him. They both walked side by side. "We're gonna go to a restaurant. Us, and the team so… it's a lot of people."

"I can tolerate it."

James snorted. "You better be..."

●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●•●

The alarm on his phone buzzed so loudly, that the once sleeping Ethan jumped and fell right off his bed in a yelp. He then stumbled to sit up and stare at his disrespectful alarm sound before sliding it off with a tired finger. The man leaned against the side of his bed with his palm on his forehead while looking down at the notifications on his phone; he had several text messages from his girlfriend that he didn't read because he was damn near dead asleep, and during this time she was still at his place.

Speaking of which… where could she be? Out, of course. He'll leave the thought at that.

He slowly stood up and groggily made his way to the bathroom right next door to his room to do his whole sad routine of waking up. He brushed his teeth, took a shower and almost slept while doing so, and got into a fresh pair of sweats and a shirt before heading to his kitchen to make breakfast. His apartment was all on one floor with two bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, a bathroom, and a parking space. Before he had quit his job not out his own choice, he was making just about enough to comfortably live and then some, but that same amount of money meant almost nothing because he technically was living with his girlfriend.

She had her own place, but she likes to spent time in his home. That includes taking quite the majority of his free money and using it for her own benefit, basically a freeloader for the most part all the while holding the threat of doing something to get him in trouble if he ever snatched that privilege away from her. And besides, with her good looks, her manipulative ways and her allure, such a thing wouldn't be hard to do.

This was practically what he lives with for the past several months. She wasn't like this all the time, but Ethan may have made some desperate decisions back in college and she isn't necessarily the most selfless person on the planet. Despite all of this, the greatest advantage he had was that she was not always here, so his home would be silent and he would be left alone most of the time.

Opening the fridge, he sighed as he realized he needed to do some grocery shopping. The Mandalan food he bought yesterday was completely finished and left out on his countertop as if it wasn't. He sighed and opened a protein bar from his cabinet, barely getting to open it before his phone rang suddenly. Ethan jumped, and looked down at the caller ID. This was some random number again, but he chose to pick it up anyways.

"Uhh…" Geez, this dude heavily suffers from the _Uh Syndrome_. "Hello?"

"Where are you?"

He didn't recognize the voice at first, but it was that same British sounding guy from- "I'm… in my house? Why?"

"Have you _not_ gotten dressed for work yet!?" Avery was on the other end, holding a bunch of papers before dropping them at the response he just got. Ethan blinked like six times while staring at his phone, there was a pause. "... _Hello_?"

"...Wha…?" Ethan was so confused, and he heard Avery's annoyed scoff on the other end.

"Since you didn't answer the call a few days ago, I gonna assume you also didn't look at the voicemail." Ethan blinked again; so that _wasn't_ some random number. "You are supposed to work today, Ethan."

"WAIT…" Ethan raised his arms as if Avery was right in front of him. He got a curt 'What' as a reply. "I… I-I thought I wasn't approved or something. He just told me 'that's all' and that was it!"

Avery furrowed a brow on the other end. "Did he outright say he didn't approve of you?"

A pause. "...No…"

"Then bring your ass here!" Ethan wondered if Ambrose heard this guy curse, because he sounded relatively loud. "You're late!"

"How late am I?" Ethan didn't even take one bite into his protein bar yet, so he did so after asking.

"Fifty minutes."

The piece of protein bar in his mouth fell out and Ethan bit his damn tongue. He groaned painfully before stammering to respond. "Uh I-I-I'm that late? Oww."

Avery frowned, he was already tired of how slow this guy was, but to fair Ethan just woke up so... " _Yes._ "

"I'll-I'll be right there!" He didn't waste any time; Ethan hung up the phone, made a beeline up the stairs and proceeded to put on a black suit with a white tie. He fumbled around for several important things, thinking he needed his briefcase as well as looking for his car keys when they were already in his hand, and then ran right outside to where his car was. Thank goodness it was there, and his girlfriend didn't take it out to wherever she'd take it to. He jumped right in, placed everything on the passenger seat and revved up the engine. The vehicle hovered above the ground before exiting the street and going right to the South City highway. Before his interview, Ethan took a plane to South City late at night in order to rent a two-day apartment and settle in at the other city. Now that he was back where he lived, this ride would take around 45 minutes, which means he'll be _extra-extra_ late, which means his first day at work would have to be shadowed by that single fact. _And_ his new boss was the richest man in the world, a part of one of the most competitive markets on a global scale.

 _God Shit._

He didn't stop anywhere and just made a beeline straight for Rose Corp while abiding by the speed limits of course, and the second he stopped in front of the huge intimidating building he ripped himself out of his car with his briefcase and keys and sprinted into the entrance's lofty lobby. Skipping the water fountains, he was about to run towards the elevators before he realized… _What floor is his office located? Which elevator room should I go to?_

 _...What was my job choice here again?_

Ethan took a deep breath and turned right back to the receptionist, who was watching the spectacle of this man. "Where is Ambrose's office?"

The words that came out of his mouth were breathy; he just sprinted as fast as he could without any food in him, and just realized how exhausted he was. The receptionist blinked. "You see those elevators on the first quadrant, right?" The receptionist pointed backwards to the elevator division that had a symbolic numeral one on it and was the closest. Ethan nodded. "Take that up to the 14th floor."

How freaking fast are the elevators here? The last time he was in this building, going up there felt like a few to several floors up. "Okay. Thank you." Ethan was still breathing a bit roughly, but he still quick jogged his way to the designated elevators before the receptionist could say anything more. He pressed the 12th button, went up, got out, and took calculated steps to the joint office.

The second he turned to the always opened glass doors, he didn't see Avery; all he saw was that same master desk in the room on the other side of this joint office hallway… With Ambrose sitting right there looking downwards. Using his insane ninja skills, Ethan slipped right in while keeping his eyes on his new boss and taking baby steps towards his desk. He didn't see the box on the floor, so his foot ended up getting stuck in front of it and Ethan fell on his chest.

...Life has a cruel sense of humor, sometimes.

"Oww… Aww-" Ethan's briefcase was somewhere ahead of him, and he looked down at the carpeted floor. Luckily it was carpet though, his chest would have hurt badly if he were hardwood or something of that nature-

"Ethan."

Every muscle in Ethan's body got so tense, he was convinced his heart stopped momentarily. That soft voice wasn't anger or irritation either but it still scared him shitless. Blue eyes slowly turned upwards to see his boss standing right by his own office entrance with a neutral expression on his face.

"Uhh…" he stumbled right the heck back up. "I-I'm sorry I was late, I just…" What excuse did he have? Ambrose approached his briefcase and picked it up to hand it to his new and frazzled employee. Ethan took it with shaky hands. "Sorry…"

His mind wasn't working correctly after running on an empty stomach and waking up on the wrong side of bed. Ambrose folded his hands behind his back. "I didn't formally tell you that you were hired, but I'm sure Avery relayed that message to you the day after your interview with me."

Why was he hired? Ethan was a retard at best, but here he would be a pleb. "I kind of didn't… look at the voicemail."

The engineer's brow raised. "Why?"

"I didn't save the number..." Ethan scratched the back of his head. He was surprised that he wasn't getting his head chewed off, especially considering who he's talking to.

There was a pause, and then Ambrose spoke again. "It's fine."

Ethan blinked incredulously at him. "H-huh?"

"It's your real first day here, isn't it not? You technically didn't know if I hired you or not. This was just an accident on your part." Ethan blinked at him with wide eyes, making Ambrose crack a tiny smile at the look on his face. "Just get to work."

Ethan still was registering how _smooth_ this whole situation just went. He nodded slowly and slowly approached his own desk. "O-okay…"

Ambrose walked backwards while smirking at Ethan. "Don't forget to save Avery's number next time." He turned around, and continued whatever he had to do, leaving Ethan stunned as fuck.

The man sat in his new office chair and _gosh this is soft_. What was he supposed to do?

"'Ey." The curt voice of Avery came about from the entrance of the joint hallway. Ethan whipped his head to look at him, and Avery cocked his neck back. "You'll end up getting whiplash if you swing your head like that."

"Oh." Ethan looked down. "Sorry."

Avery's eyes narrowed. _Yeah, this guy's head isn't on his shoulders._ "You know what to do, don't you?"

"...not really."

"Have you ever been a receptionist?"

"I have." Ethan nodded.

"Well, it's like that here but with a twist. You as a second assistant will have to manage and keep track of all the things related to mathematics and computer science." Avery went to sit at his desk as Ethan nodded slowly. "That includes all the meetings, the blueprints and other items sent from other companies. Ambrose has multiple bigname handles, and I manage all the fashion notifications for him. You are his computer science admin, and Evan is his agriculture and architecture admin."

Nigh-braindead Ethan nodded. "Is Evan that robot guy?"

"No, that is Chandler." Avery corrected. "He's basically Ambrose's right-hand man, and the sub for whenever he can't be in office. If he heard you call him a robot, he'd probably punch you." Avery shook his head.

"... Isn't he a robot?" Ethan frowned.

" _No,_ he is an AI. A super-AI, to be more exact."

Ethan's frown grew deeper. "Aren't they the same thing?"

Avery blinked twice. This is like someone calling a toaster and a computer the same thing. "No…They aren't." He didn't need to divulge any further, Ethan will figure it out later. "Anyways, like I said; answer calls if there are any, take in anything from any other company or corp, tell him about any events or things scheduled for him. That's just about it."

"Oh…" He understood now, kind of. "Wait so… what's the twist while doing this? This is just a regular assistant job."

"Not necessarily." Avery crossed his arms. "Almost everyone who works here is very savvy with something that benefits both them, and the Corp overall. They can make and come up with whatever they put work into, and use that to perhaps… fuel their reputation in a sense."

"So you mean… you can work here and you also create stuff that can make you even more money?"

How did Ethan's tired ass brain comprehend _that_? "Basically. It's more exciting than it sounds but… judging from the questions you just asked me you won't be doing that for quite a while." Avery smirked to himself. "Did he speak with you yet?"

"He did." Ethan said. "He wasn't upset."

Avery frowned. "Of course he wasn't." That wasn't sarcasm or anything. Ambrose wouldn't get upset if someone was late, unless they purposely do so and don't do what their supposed to. "He knows your whole situation already."

"Then why were you upset?"

"Because I hate unorganized people." He placed electronic papers in front of him, looking through the pieces that were a part of Ambrose's collection. He closed off the conversation there when the phone on his desk rang and he answered it. Ethan watched how brief and professional Avery handled the call, simple 'Yes's or 'No's and brief sentences ending with a farewell before hanging up the phone. Ethan worked as an IT receptionist before, so technically this position he's in now would be the same thing since it's concerning technology. To say he didn't know anything about computers would be wrong, he knew just about enough to make a good score on that last job before he lad to leave. Ethan looked down at his neat and clean desk, and at the computer screen before him, before he took a deep breath.

 _This will be easy..._

 **¶°¶°¶°¶°¶°¶°¶°¶°¶°¶**

If Zamasu wanted to, he could've flew back to Tycho on his own but he decided not to. There were a myriad of thing he decided not to do over the past week, and it is quite surprising that he somehow rejected the actions that he could have done. He could have left every night to go and see Ollie and Loki, he could've cracked open a cold one with the boys again.

But, he _should have_ not left Adrian's house the day he and the guys returned, and he should have not put on his gi to go and see Rebecca once more. Here's why.

Shona, Zachary, and Mace all stayed and kicked it with with the main quartet of the group until late in the evening, and then the three decided to leave at different times because they have things to do. So at this point, Adrian drove him, Jay and James to Rebecca's house to drop him off there.

"Apparently, Rebecca texted me just now." Jay looked uninterestedly at his phone.

Adrian flicker his gaze at Jay's phone. "What happened?"

"She said that if we're coming over then that's fine, but we didn't need to go to her house."

As elusive as that brief conversation was, that should have been his first warning.

Then, once they got through the gates to her home they got out of the car, rung the doorbell, and chatted amongst themselves until the door opened to reveal Rebecca smiling. This wasn't some regular smile, this smile had something else lurking deep within it, something that Zamasu didn't know was in store for him. That was his _second_ warning, but he didn't pay heed to that either.

The guys were allowed into Rebecca's home, and Ollie jumped right into Adrian's arms when the music producer knelt to jug him. The Kaioshin noticed that not only was she here, but Ashley was also sitting on the couch talking with Lexi, the model looked extremely ecstatic talking about something that occurred after her trip to Lyn. Jay gave his girlfriend a sweet kiss and so did Adrian to Ashley, and James stood there with his arms crossed. Zamasu greeted both Ashley and Lexi, the model giving him a playfully cross look and he shrugged with a smirk on his face. Look, you don't just hide macarons from a God without him knowing, that's nigh-impossible.

Zamasu noticed that glint in James' eyes, the kind where you know he knows something that you don't. The Kaioshin, after greeting Rebecca, went over to stand by the basketball player. "Why are you looking like that?"

"Hmm?" James looked at him. "Oh, nothing."

Zamasu stood in front of him. "You're making a weird face."

"Bro." James chuckled. "It's nothing. I'm just standing around." Zamasu was about to question him a little bit more before he heard another female voice coming from upstairs.

"Is that who I think it is?"

That wasn't Rebecca. That wasn't Lexi, nor Ashley. And it certainly wasn't June either. Zamasu froze, everything that he once had as a mindset two months ago started pouring back in. James looked up, and so did Adrian and Jay.

"Heyy guysss!" The woman finally touched ground with the living room, and Adrian couldn't resist to hug her tightly. Her afro bounced along with the sheer strength of her best guy friend. James did the same thing too, while kissing her in the lips.

"Irene's back, y'all!" Jay gave her a hug as the other women in the room giggled. And then there was Zamasu, who didn't turn around, what didn't even move out of his spot. Al he did was twitch his eye.

And then this wretched woman decided to come up behind him and touch his damn shoulders. "Zamasu, it's been a _long time_ since I've seen you!"

 _It's only been a damn month, for crying out loud_. But then again, this month was slower than any month he's ever lived through. So much happened in such a small timespan. He didn't respond to her at first, he was too busy deeply breathing in order to swallow his pride and face her. "Hello-"

She looked different. Zamasu hadn't seen those big chocolate brown eyes in a while and looking at them now made him cock his neck back. She still had the afro, it was probably the makeup she was wearing. He kind of wasn't used to her face being done.

She smiled up at him. "Zee-zee!" And then proceeded to try and hug him but he quickly held his arms out to keep her away.

"I told you not to call me that!"

"Why not?" Irene furrowed a brow. "It's better than Green Apple, isn't it?"

His eye twitched again. "They are both equally horrendous."

"Oh come on." Irene waved a hand. "I thought this whole month would loosen you up, at least. You're still all prickly and stuff."

"It _might_ have." Zamasu shot back. "But you're annoying."

"Alright look." Rebecca went in between the two. "This was supposed to be a nice little reunion between you two, please don't start bickering again."

Lexi smiled. "Isn't that their whole thing, though? Just arguing all the time?" She then waved a dismissive hand. "Let 'em, they haven't had an earful of each other for a month."

"You'd think I'd _want_ an earful of _this?!"_ Zamasu pointed at Irene.

"I'm pretty sure you do." The beautiful model's sarcasm made him groaned in annoyance. It sucks that she's pretty, and no he doesn't like her.

"It was fun while it begun." Adrian clasped his hands together. Zamasu found his wording weird, but he glared at him nonetheless. "How was the exhibition?"

"Oh boy, it was fun!" Irene smiled. She got pumped up over talking about her art, he noticed how jumpy she was. "Traveled around the world, met so many amazing artists and we all had insane after-parties in different countries; I didn't think Mandalan noodles were that good."

If Shona or Mace were there, they would've scoffed along with Jay. " _Excuse you?_ "

"Gee, _sorry_." Irene stook her tongue out at him and Jay rolled his eyes with a smirk. "But yeah, it was overall an opening experience. I loved it." Hopefully it opened her ignorant brain up, in the least. Zamasu should not be the one talking, he was the one who needed such a thing the most.

The entire group of eight decided to talk amongst each other, lounging on Rebecca's couches. Zamasu didn't speak much, but luckily he was sitting right next to Adrian, Jay and Ashley, who are the chillest of the group so far. Rebecca was talking with girls, but she didn't speak with James at all about his game like all the other women were. Loki sat on Zamasu's lap midway, the two dogs ended up fighting each other for their rightful spot until Zamasu decided to hold the both of them, and Rebecca brought out the large batch of cookies she and Lexi bought from a famous pink-themed bakery. About an hour into the whole hangout was when they all decided to depart, which meant Zamasu had to go to Irene's house. The ride was quiet, Zamasu didn't speak much except short-end questions and that was it. Irene knew he was peeved off to see her again, but he'll get used to it. From what Rebecca told her, he's grown quite exceptionally, so it won't take long for him to stop being a cactus in her presence.

Entering Irene's house felt like a weird, conflicting wave of nostalgia. He hadn't been here ever since that one time he smuggled some chocolate from her cabinet, and that wasn't even a long time ago but it felt like so. He looked around the small and modest abode, the size difference between her house and Rebecca's was more noticeable now than ever. However, her home felt roomy and comfortable similar to Ambrose's.

Geez, it just hit him that he spent some time with the world's richest not even a week ago.

"So." Irene placed her bag down. Apparently, she had already settled in her luggage before he and the guys saw her. "How was it?"

"Great." Simplest answer possible. "Before you came."

"Oh, lighten up, Z." She approached him. "I haven't done anything irritating to you yet."

" _Yet_." Zamasu emphasized, narrowing his eyes.

"You're really pessimistic, dude." Irene shook her head. "Ya know what…" She came to plop right in front of him. She was really jumpy today, "Since ya don't wanna talk to me, you can just go upstairs and read to sort yourself out."

"I'm already sorted out, _woman._ " Zamasu shot back at her. "But I'll still go and enjoy the creative intelligence of a book. Goodnight."

That was petty. He might have to inwardly admit it, that was sort of petty, but he wanted solitude right now. He went upstairs, already knowing he had a pile of books waiting to be read in his room. His luggage bag was in hand the whole time, he dropped it and went right to his bed with a book in hand. This is like the introvert's ultimate dream after being around people for so long; don't get him wrong, those he was with were tolerable, and… interesting, but ain't no way in the Kai's realm would be sit his ass down to chat with Irene. That's like saying he'll kiss some rich dude outside in a small snowy meadow…That's nigh-impossible of a situation.

He took a deep breath, staring out of the window that he always stares at and gosh did he realize how much he missed the quiet. Everything was so simple when he was here; he had no one to deal with, no business to handle- well he still doesn't- but now that he knows more about the group and about some other people, he can't guarantee that he'll be here reading about things as often as he used to.

Still, reclined against his bed, he chose to later cherish the moments when he can be introverted, and embrace the days when he can't.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Ultra Instinct Alma and Ultra Instinct James… I'm joking lol, please don't take that to heart; those guys that found Alma were really reckless and that's obvious to anyone who has an iota of self defense abilities.**

 **Zamasu used his Godly powers to exact a message, just because of what James said in his speech. This just goes to show that the two have grown quite week in a short amount of time, putting away their major differences. A big step in evolution for Zamasu of course. Heartwarming, ain't it? And that portion of Zamasu thinking of Gowasu at the end of their talk shows that there was some insecurity in how Zamasu thinks Gowasu feels about him, and that is reflected on behalf of James' grandaunt's care for James' wellbeing. It's something he never really thought Gowasu had done before and realized he was dead wrong at that fact...**

 **I want y'all to take into account what Andrea said about Alma. Why would Merkel and her liege want this little wandering girl? And why** _ **is**_ **she wandering? Hnn… hella questions in this binch.**

 **Y'all… Irene is back, it's over, Zamasu's happy-train has crashed and now he must go back to her damned house. Well, the house part isn't a problem but the 'she's here and now I have to stay near her' part is hell to him. How long will it take for him to actually take a liking to her? Will that ever happen?**


	31. New Beginnings

**This is a quick PSA to anyone out there going through a rough patch in their lives. I know how it feels to be stuck in a loop of shit and to know that you gotta fight your own battles with little support, but just know that things will get 's going to change and throw glitter at you when you least expect it.**

 **Alright, maybe** _ **glitter**_ **is a little annoying because how are you gonna get that shit off your clothes? Let's change that to confetti, right? Right,** _ **confetti**_ **.**

 **I had to say this because I can vouch for being down for a prolonged period of time, and I would be lying if I said that life's been positive lately, but know that what you're going through right now is temporary, it won't be forever as long as you don't make it to be :).**

 **With that being said, on with this chapter...**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **New Beginnings**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Ethan took the deepest breath he could possibly muster.

Today was… probably the most difficult, confusing, and tiring day of his entire life. He didn't even leave his desk at least once, but _gosh_ … nearly every phone call that made it to his desk ended with him blinking at the device before attempting to write down whatever he was told. He thought that his experience working as an IT receptionist would suit him well in a job like this, however he didn't factor in how easy his first job was compared to this.

Like, the questions people asked back then were so simple and straightforward, but _here_? In just a few hours, Ethan heard of at least a hundred or so new words that he never knew existed, as well as trying to comprehend what the blueprints that were being sent to him were. Some who have called did take the time to briefly explain what it is they meant, and other times were just…

" _...The adaptations of nanoabsorbent synth-mineral can be sent to my archives later this evening, since it's been open for a couple of hours or so." Says the person on the other end._

" _Oh, no problem." Ethan held the phone in between his cheek and shoulder with a pen in one hand right in front of a bunch of post-its. "Uhh, what's a nanoabsorbent synth-mineral?"_

 _The other was silent, before they abruptly hung up, and Ethan stared at the phone, blinking for a long time._

There weren't that many calls that he had, so he was just staring at his computer screen occasionally. Was he expected to know _this_ much before applying here? Do normal people even talk about stuff like that?

He sighed. It was 8:50 at night, he arrived here at around 3:45 so he has spent at least five hours doing this stuff. Two hands went to each temple, he felt embarrassed. What if all those abrupt ending calls were super important, and Ambrose didn't get the confirmation he actually needed?

"Yo."

Ethan looked up to see Chandler. The AI was wearing a snazzy velvet trench coat with yellow accents. Ethan greeted him. "Hello, Chandler."

Chandler held up two fingers in regards to his greeting before placing the suitcase he was holding on Ethan's desk. "You do realize your shift ends in like ten minutes, right?"

"Wait, what?" Ethan frowned. "Really? Wait… how do you know?"

Chandler nodded. "It's kinda rare for anyone here to work more than six hours. But you came late so…"

"Does everyone know about that?!" Ethan felt the embarrassment creep up even further. This was _just his luck._

"Not everyone; me, Avery, Ambrose, Evan, we know." Chandler chuckled. "It's no biggie, stuff like that happens. Ambrose probably wasn't even upset at you."

It was true; he wasn't, but Ethan was not used to that kind of lenience. "...Okay." He looked down at his desk before popping an amazing question. "When people first start working here, do they know about all that high-tech stuff that the companies call for?"

Chandler blinked. "No… we'd be surprised if a newcomer of your caliber were to know _a lick_ of the advanced stuff. If you're worried about sounding like an idiot, you don't need to be; it's not expected of you." He leaned against the desk with crossed arms. "Besides, most of your calls were relayed to me instead. Today is a day where you kinda get a feel for how this place is."

 _Most?_ "So all the work I had to do was put on you?" Ethan furrowed a brow. "Isn't that tiring for you?"

"Ethan, I'm an AI." He pointed at himself. "I could take on the jobs of both you and Avery alone. Ambrose knew that you'd be confused out of your wits today, don't worry about it."

That is true, Ethan let out a tiny timid chuckle; this Chandler guy was pretty chill. "Uhh, thanks."

"No problem." Chandler picked his suitcase up. "You look hungry."

"Oh, uhh…" At the mention of that, Ethan's stomach growled loudly. He chuckled and scratched the back of his head. "I haven't eaten since I woke up."

"Are you serious?!" Chandler frowned. "That's crazy! There are a bunch of food courts in this entire building and you didn't go to any one of them?"

Ethan blinked like five times before asking an intelligent question. "There are food courts?"

Chandler closed his eyes and sighed. "Yes. Wouldn't it be peculiar for a big building like this to not have such? I'll admit; the building is huge, but when you enter, like _literally in front of you_ ," he articulated comically, "There is a map of the entire corporation. There are signs and maps everywhere that show you where everything is. It's not that hard to navigate through here once you get used to it."

But Ethan didn't even look when he saw that either. What a _smart_ move on his part. "...Oh."

"'Ey Chandler." In came this other guy who had black green hair and very dark green eyes. This was Evan, the head admin of the agriculture sector. "I'm boutta clock out, you- oh, that's the new guy. Hey there." Ethan waved at Evan. "How are ya?"

"I'm uhh… good." Ethan smiled.

Chandler turned to Evan, while gesturing with his thumb at Ethan. "I was just giving him a little rundown of this building, because he didn't eat anything this whole time."

"Really?" This made Evan glance at Ethan wide-eyed. "How could you miss out on the food here?!"

"I had no idea that stuff existed." Correction, he didn't think to find out if that stuff existed. "So… I mean, I can go there now, right?"

"Anytime." Evan shrugged before tossing his key chain up and catching it with one hand. "Don't ever come here and starve yourself, for real. Chandler you wanna go for a tride for awhile?"

Chandler smiled. "Eh, why not."

Ethan learned another word today: _tride_. "What's a tride?"

"A 'trill ride'." Chandler shook his head and pointed at Evan. "This one made it up."

"It's _clever_." Evan said as he exited the joint hallway with Chandler giving him a sarcastic remark back. Ethan smiled, they were a chill bunch. Chandler looked back at Ethan and gave him a farewell. He watched the AI approach the door.

"Chandler?"

Chandler turned back to Ethan. "Yeah?"

A pause, before he asked his question. "Why did he dial back on hiring me?"

Chandler knew what he meant; Ethan came in on his first day with a less than confident vibe about him. He raised a brow nonchalantly. "Because he wanted to hire you."

What a simple ass answer. "But don't I have to be insanely smart to even be _around_ here _?_ "

"You look like someone who ought to be a mathematician." Chandler meant that too. As expected, Ethan gave him a confused look and he smiled, as that reason is only part of what Ambrose considered in Ethan. "That's according to me, Ambrose, and Evan."

"How…?" The man blinked. "How can you tell that by looking at someone?"

"Trust me," Chandler smirked at him while holding the door open, "Genius mathematicians can tell another mathematician when they see one. You may not know it now, but it will catch on in the future." With that, Chandler left through the glass doors of the joint office, leaving Ethan by himself. Ambrose hadn't left yet, he was with the other mathematicians of the building in 'one of those other big rooms', as Ethan would call it for now. He looked down at his stomach, the sickening pit that grew way too deep with time was getting progressively louder. He decided to treat himself to something in one of the food courts, noting what Chandler said about the maps around the building. Notably the ones by the elevator rooms hung on the walls and were holographic, he could use those to navigate.

He stood up, and looked down at his beyond messy desk. He decided to clock out, and then eat something at one of the food courts. This job was going to pull out random legs from him, legs that he didn't even know existed, and the same ones that would end up turning him into a person he never thought he could be…

But of course, Ethan didn't need to know _anything_ about that yet…

 **{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}**

"Woman."

It was the morning after Irene returned. Zamasu looked up at Irene, who was dancing in the kitchen while he was sitting in the living room. She did this weird move where she would raise her hands before spin jumping to look at him. "Yes?"

And while this was going on, Zamasu was trying to eat his breakfast danishes with a cup of tea in peace. "What are you doing?"

"I'm dancing!" She hopped around with a plate in hand, serving himself before grooving her way to sit across from Zamasu. Sometime in between that whole action, he wanted her to slip and fall and probably pass out before she got to him.

She sat down, took a fork in hand and placed it into her scrambled eggs. "When are you gonna go to Rebecca's place again? She said she's being trained by you."

"Today." He wasn't wrong; his godly memory can recall the fact that today would be a feasible day to go and train her, since she's off today.

Irene's big eyes widened. "Oh, really?"

"Yes." Came his bland reply.

"How come you don't try to train me?"

"You never asked." He took a sip of his tea before closing his eyes. "And even if you did, you wouldn't possibly be capable of harnessing any kind of prowess."

That literally is the reason why anyone usually goes to train; they want to increase their ability to defend themselves. Of course, Irene was joking around about the idea because she doesn't care much about martial arts. With the amount of protection she had, she figured she had no need to learn such a thing. "Uh huh, I think you'd say the same for Rebecca too, who doesn't know how to make a simple ki blast."

"She has potential." He opened his eyes. "And is eager to learn self defense for herself."

"Hnn." Irene nodded. "That's quite nice; you're actually interacting with humans and stuff. Bravo, you're evolving." She clapped, and he had the urge to slap her hands.

"Rebecca shares the same views that I do." He frowned at her. "And she's smart, so she's tolerable."

"As in 'I wanna kill mortals for being stupid'?"

Now, after that chat with Ambrose, he had to dial back on the murdering thing for a moment before rebutting her statement quite quickly. "You wouldn't understand."

"You haven't been around good people, or rather you just don't know many good people to you." Irene shrugged. "Rebecca says that because she has a reason for her hate."

Zamasu's frown deepened. "And you're saying I don't?"

Irene shrugged.

The Kaioshin scoffed. "I've lived long enough to ascertain such a belief."

"Yup." She just nodded. "Cool."

If there was a time where he would have slapped her head off it would be _now_ , but that time is _not_ now. He decided it was best to just eat his danishes, and not engage this idiot any further. Right now, he just wants to go to Rebecca's and train her. And that's exactly what he did.

After he had finished, the Kaioshin used his obvious magic skills to clean up both his teacup and plate and placed them into the dish rack. He put on his white boots and opened her front door to leave.

"Say hi to her for me!"

"I won't." Zamasu frowned at her.

Irene went to stand by the door, holding the knob and leaning forward with a smile on her face. Zamasu cocked his neck back, she was way too freaking close. "That's not nice, Zee-Zee. She's my best friend."

 _Right, that's unfortunate._ "Just close the damn door." Zamasu turned around and floated just several feet above the air before teleporting right into Rebecca's living room. He was facing her wall windows, and the first person he saw outside wasn't Rebecca.

It was Terry.

Zamasu frowned. He noticed that the man had just exited out of his car and stopped in front of her door, his body now out of Zamasu's view. Terry had a few bandages on his person, as well as… stitches? Zamasu frowned, _where did he get those from?_ The doorbell rang, and Zamasu at first paused to see if Rebecca would come down the stairs, but he blinked when he realized he couldn't sense her. So she wasn't at home at the moment, and she doesn't have work today. Perhaps she was out with someone else, it wouldn't hurt to give that bit of info to the gynecologist.

"Hello."

Again, when the door opened Terry had to blink because this wasn't Rebecca. The gynecologist raised his brows at the green God. "Hi uhh… Zamasu, right?"

"Yes." The Kaioshin nodded. "What's wrong?"

"Oh, nothing much." He shrugged with a tiny smile. That smile may have been small, but it said a lot of Zamasu, just enough to make him frown. "I just came by to see Rebecca. Ya know, see if she's okay."

He raised a brow. "I'm pretty sure she's fine. She's just not in her house right now."

Terry blinked again, and cocked his neck back. "Oh… I mean, I did text her and call her yesterday and she wasn't applicable."

"Perhaps she was sleeping?" He raised an obvious question, that was supplemented with a more obvious answer.

"I don't think anyone would fall asleep for eight random hours in the day." Terry had a quirked brow. "I called last evening and this morning, only twice. And I even called as I was driving here, but she wasn't applicable."

If the woman had left, then she definitely would have her phone. Zamasu knew she couldn't go anywhere without that tiny little device. "Does this have something to do with those bandages on you?"

Terry looked down and then back at the God. "Kind of… I got into a little bit of a rut with some…" He was going to bottle up what he had to say to his coworker, but he figured that this man knew something about what was going on in this planet. "Wait, you know about the whole weird crime thing going on, right?"

"I am well aware." Zamasu nodded, and then it quickly clicked. "...Were you involved with any of that?"

Terry would come clean with this. "I got jumped by a few of those people." Then he looked to the side, simplifying his next statement because it would sound weird if he said a famous person came over to save him. "Some guy saw, and beat their asses."

"Some guy?" There were pieces that were clicking in Zamasu's head. "Was this man of any status?"

Terry's eyes widened, _how did he figure that out?!_ "Umm… yeah…"

Zamasu placed a finger on his chin. "So Shona was right…"

"You know Shona?!" His Asiatic Mandalan eyes widened even more, and they looked like saucers. "How?! Rebecca doesn't even know him!"

"I am affiliated with some of his friends." Zamasu tilted his head. "So you didn't just come by to let Rebecca know that _you_ are okay?" Zamasu put the emphasis on Terry for a reason; Rebecca hasn't been harmed at all, but from the way terry was speaking seems to show Zamasu that Rebecca isn't aware of Terry's wellbeing. Judging from the stitches in some places, this happened more than a week ago, before he himself had met Shona.

Terry thought about that answer for a moment. "I _did_ come here for that too." Terry had a bag slung over his arm. "And I also gotta give this back to her. It's a book, she usually tells me that I can place it back on her coffee table whenever I can so…"

Zamasu allowed him in, knowing that was what he was going to ask. He realized that there was something lingering in his man's gestures; Terry was suspicious about something. "I'm just gonna put this here and then leave so don't bothe-"

Zamasu turned around to see Terry looking down at the coffee table. He picked up a very familiar device and frowned. "Huh. She left her phone here?"

Since this wasn't the first time she's done this, Zamasu figured that she was getting better with her phone habits. But Terry knew Rebecca very well, she never leaves her phone anywhere, even if she didn't need it. "Ah, that's weird. I guess it's a spur of the moment thing." He smiled. "Alright, gotta be on my way. Thanks." He gave Zamasu an acknowledging nod before opening Rebecca's door again. Zamasu nodded back, despite not being able to shake off the skepticism that was brewing in Terry's head. It was fading with every moment, but it was _there._

Soon, he heard Terry's car pull right out of the driveway through Rebecca's gates. The Kaioshin took this time to look around the house that he once mainly inhabited about a week ago; it was silent, perhaps Ollie and Loki were asleep upstairs. Since Rebecca isn't here, he should teleport back to Irene's house and finish that book of his, maybe he could grab a hold of _Endmite_ again and reread that because despite knowing the damn author was a near whore (poor choice of words, but Zamasu felt vile towards her).

He went upstairs, retrieved said book and took a look at several pages, and right as he was approaching the living room again Rebecca's door was opened again. This time, he knew it was Rebecca.

She stepped in, sighed in a weirdly frustrated manner, but the look was supplanted by a neutral facial expression. Rebecca went to her couch, tossed her bag and plopped down while reaching for her phone, she looked at the screen for a moment before looking to the side (away from Zamasu) and then making a swipe motion before turning it off. It was at this moment, while she was lounging, that she turned her head and saw the green God standing by her stairs.

"Zamasu?" She frowned. "Uhh… Good afternoon?"

"Have you forgotten today is your training day?" He crossed his arms, book still in hand.

A pause, before her eyes lit up. "Oh, _yeahhh!"_ She nearly skipped over to him. "What are we gonna learn today?"

"I think you ought to see." The Kaioshin smiled down at her. "Come." He and Rebecca walked right out to her backyard, normally where they would usually train. He walked a bit in front of her to turn around.

"Zamasu?"

"What?" He blinked.

"How long were you in my house?" She asked.

"Several minutes before your return. Why?" Zamasu frowned.

"Oh…" Rebecca nodded. "Did anyone come by while I wasn't here?"

That is a _strangely_ correlative question. "Yes?" He nodded slowly. "It was that friend of yours, I believe his name is Terry, and he had to return a book."

Her only response was, "Oh." Before she nodded and asked again out of curiosity. "What do you have instore for me today?"

Should it be noted that Terry wanted to know if Rebecca was safe, and also wanted to tell her that he himself was okay as well? _Did_ she know that Terry was attacked by the supposedly same people who came after her? Zamasu dismissed the thoughts for now, he answered her immediate question with a slight shrug, before quickly raising his hand in front of Rebecca's face.

To his surprise, she held it even though it wouldn't have made contact with her in the first place. He smirked. "Your reflexes. I'm putting you on defense this time."

He already taught her how to block, though dodging is harder for her and what's a better way to learn than tackling your weaknesses early? Rebecca raised both brows before nodding and getting into a stance. He noticed that this particular stance was… a similar fighting stance that Lexi had when she fought Jay. That was an advanced form of martial arts that he had not taught Rebecca yet, so the way she did it was a lot less imposing compared to Lexi.

"Is someone else teaching you as well?"

Rebecca blinked. "Oh, uhh… Lexi would come over more often whenever she had the chance to while you were gone. She showed me this but… I dunno any of the like, movesets for this particular style."

Zamasu nodded in acknowledgement. "I can teach you that That particular stance is suited for Mav Kraga, a style that is mostly focused on reflexes and instincts. Coincidentally enough, it ties up well with what you will be learning today." Mav Kraga is an old revived Kilikian martial art style, commonly used worldwide in many self-defense classes. Don't say Zamasu hasn't been doing his homework as an apprentice.

"Ohhh, that's cool!" That's the same reaction every novice to martial arts has when introduced to a new style. "Lexi did tell me the name, but I forgot it." She chuckled, and made an offhand comment while getting herself prepared for today's lesson. "I wonder what she's doing now…"

 **{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}•{•}**

You wanna know what this beautiful model is doing right now? She is driving right back to Rose Corp to work with Ambrose for the second time. All of this with slightly pink stained cheeks.

Lexi is a very confident person, don't get her wrong. But she would be lying if she said her slight fangirl tendencies weren't getting in the way of her person when she first saw him. That first meeting was mostly him talking initially, before she slowly and gradually got comfortable to say more than two words to him. The whole time, however, there were no moves made that would jeopardize the atmosphere of the whole thing, which was strictly business; he didn't try to hit on her or anything (which was something a lot of these rich guys would do when they cooperate with a model that looked like her), everything he did was straight to the point, while Lexi would find herself staring at him accidentally.

She stopped her car right in front of the giant, tech-savvy building. She could've taken a plane but she wanted to leave early and still get there on time. Lexi had a bunch of drawings of her own collection as well as some newer ideas that he presented to her which were insanely genius (shouldn't be a surprise). She got out of the car and entered the building, went up those elevators to the twelfth floor, and walked through a hallway that lead to the joint offices.

This may be one of the most intimidating walks that she imagined would be for an employee here, because his desk was right there, meaning that if his door was open, he would see the person walking towards him before they even entered the joint rooms. This time, she didn't see him sitting on the desk, so she walked a bit faster, of course greeting the two guys and that yellow robot dude whilst walking to his office.

 _The one with the Locette Efilian accent is pretty hot_ , she thought.

Avery told her that she could enter Ambrose's office, he was indeed in the room. The wealthy man was talking on the phone with someone in a language that sounded beautiful when rolling off his tongue, leaning against the couch on the left portion of his large office room. The engineer was wearing a burgundy silken dress shirt with black buttons, and black slacks with loafers of a darker shade of burgundy. She pursed her lips and held her collection of ideas.

He noticed her almost instantly, turning around when she entered the room. Golden eyes upon brown as he waved and gave her a acknowledging smile before saying something else over the phone and then chuckling. Lexi looked at him, _he has such a cute laugh..._

"Good afternoon." Ambrose ended the call before greeting her. "How are you doing, Lexi?"

"I'm good." She chuckled lightly. "Good afternoon to you too. Who were you talking to?" They did become amicable enough to have tiny conversations about things other than their business ventures, all thanks to him of course. Ain't no way in hell would she ever try to ease such tension between her and him so easily, _not with that damn face_.

Ambrose's eyes flicked towards his phone for a moment. "Oh, just someone."

"Who?" Lexi smiled, she was slightly bantering.

"I was talking to the person on the other end of the call." He gave her a toothy grin, and Lexi had to roll her eyes and giggle. Ambrose sat down on his couch and clasped his hands together, there were already neatly placed folders on his desk, showing that he had already prepared for today's meeting. "So, we'll continue where we left off?"

Lexi nodded. "Mmhmm." She went to sit beside him while placing her portfolio on her lap. "I did go over everything that I presented the last time I came by. And…" She accidentally looked up at him and got flustered. He wasn't doing anything at all, all he was doing was sitting next to her; it's just that his face is _really close_.

He noticed, but didn't comment on behalf of it. "And what did you find?"

She explained her thoughts, concepts and future usable ideas to him. The whole time, she noticed that he was giving her complete undivided attention, listening intently. Not only that, but he always had something to supplant her ideals, and even adding on with his own concepts that lie within those neat folders on his table. Surprisingly enough, they both had synergy in terms of what they wanted. They could be an amazing business pair for the time being, emphasis on _could_ ; Lexi still can't get over the slight shock and abashment she has over sitting right next to the richest, smartest man in the world discussing something that could open giant avenues for her career.

Not to mention he's unbelievably hot. Gosh, the crisp, brisk autumn weather outside wouldn't be enough to cool this woman down.

The entire meetup went on for quite a while, she had gotten used to his comfortable vibes already, and a portion of their chat became colloquial and informal. They did talk about stuff other than business, along with joking about random shit and things going on in their lives. There wasn't much about that last part, as in personal life, that Ambrose disclosed, but Lexi felt more than comfortable to tell him her ongoings.

Sometime in between the four hours they unintentionally spent on this project, she had left to go to the food courts to eat something. Of course, she decided to invite Ambrose, even though he wasn't hungry, and they chatted even longer. Chandler, she came to know, and Avery and joined in, as Avery is the head admin for the fashion sector, and discussed the possibility of a joint-clothing or even perfume line. They were like this well- coordinated team, it surprised her how much she learned from all three of them, especially Ambrose, in regards to fashion.

"Wow, hold on what time is it?" Ambrose looked past Lexi and at his desk, They were standing close to the door. It read 6:57; they were here since around _1_ in the afternoon. He raised his brows with a light laugh. "We've completely lost track of time."

Lexi didn't know they spent that much time talking, in fact they have gotten so much straightened out that the majority of the meetup was literally a spur of new and invigorating ideas. She chuckled. "Oh shoot… we did."

"You look apprehensive."

"Yeah I just…" she moved her hair over to one side, allowing her neck to be exposed. "I kinda don't wanna leave. I'm all buzzed up over these things."

Ambrose chuckled. "You wouldn't have to, we can always talk more, but I'm just saying that because I figured you are also quite a busy person yourself." That charming smile made its way back on his handsome face.

She blinked. "Yeah, yeah, you're right about that." A sweet smile adorned her burgundy-colored lips. "Maybe one day I can invite you to my place so we can chat more." About their accommodation, and jokes galore because why not. He gave her his number already, that wouldn't be a problem to him. _Hopefully._

"I would love to, if I'm not busy, that is." Which now that Lexi thought about it, it would be a rarity to spend some free time with him. This guy is managing at least three of the biggest market names all at once, not to mention this corporation is godly huge. "It was nice talking with you."

She didn't realize he raised a hand to shake because she was looking at his face. _Quit it, Lex!_ "Same with you. You're… I'm very honored to be working with you." She shook his hand. _His hands are warm and soft._

And safe.

"As I to you." Oh man, how could a dude be so damn hot? "I'll see you… whenever I see ya."

That was slightly informal which meant a lot of things, mostly positive. "Have a good night!" Lexi called out with returning the gesture as she exited his office. She bid farewell to Chandler, Avery and Evan as well as the new guy, Ethan, who was sort of hiding behind his computer desk whenever he saw her. That was cute, the guy himself was cute too.

She held her portfolio in hand while leaving the building and getting back into her car. This was the second discussion they had, and they have gotten through much more than any other collaborations she's ever had, and he's only _one_ person. The model could not help the giddy smile on her face.

 _That went… A lot better than expected._

 **:;:;;:;:;;:;:;;:;:;;:;:**

Two pairs of hands were making contact with one another. The sounds in Rebecca's backyard could only be distinguished as her hands colliding with his insanely-fast palms, and her slight grunting from the power she was putting into these punches. They have spent nearly six hours going through basics before Zamasu engaged into exercising her reflexes.

"Are you getting tired?"

She looked at Zamasu, who wasn't even breaking a sweat at any of the attacks she made to him. "Kinda." She lowered her fist at first, and then started hopping. "But I'm not stopping."

"That's the spirit." Zamasu smiled kindly before raising a fist right in front of her unsuspecting face. Rebecca jumped back, planted her feet on the floor and got right into her stance again. Zamasu lowered his fist. "You reacted needlessly just now. I could have punched and kicked you in the time it took for you to go back, like here, here, here…" He pointed at her chest, then her shoulder and then her leg while trailing off because of how open she was just now. She was a mere humanoid mortal, enemies that she could face aren't going to be as fast or as strong as her, and Zamasu can't fathom anyone of her minute species to reach his grasp of power, at least not yet.

Rebecca looked down and then back at him. "I kinda… I kinda did slip at that moment." She took a step forward, and shrugged with a light chuckle. "I guess it's because I've been a little worn down." She smiled at him and blinked, before swinging abruptly and without warning.

Zamasu caught her fist even before it passed his shoulders with only one finger. Grey eyes looked into green and he shook his head. "You really tried to hit me just now. Tsk Tsk." Rebecca gave him a toothy grin and he dropped her hand.

They both heard the sound of a few paws clinking with the kitchen's glass door. There was energetic Ollie and Loki, both were pretty much watching the two as the God taught the mortal and now Loki was using his paws to open the door. The second he did, they both ran over to jump right into Zamasu's arms. He had Ollie in one arm, and Loki's big ass was trying to be a lap dog again.

"You two missed me already? It's only been one day!" He smirked and placed them down, kneeling down and rubbing both their heads.

"Technically it's been more than a week. You've been at Caplax over the course of a week." Rebecca looked down at Zamasu. "Speaking of which, how was the trip?"

"It was… quite interesting." Zamasu thought about the trip, and summarized the best bits of it into one sentence. "We got into a fight."

"Wait, what?" She paused and frowned. "Who did you pick a fight with?"

"It wasn't us." The Kaioshin shook his head. "It was a setup, some rival of Shona's who met us in a massage salon along with forty of his men." Zamasu looked over to the side. "They were after someone."

Rebecca blinked. "Do you know who?"

"Not at all." Zamasu looked back at her, and Rebecca lowered her head. "It wasn't like any of us were affected by them anyway. They were all weak, compared to the men I were with and obviously me."

"So these forty guys were going after another person and stopped to fight… all of you? I dunno how many of you were there."

"It was six of us, minus James."

Rebecca raised a brow, skipping past that statement slightly. "Of course they wouldn't hurt you all, _you're_ on _Adrian and Jay's_ side for crying out loud."

"It wasn't only me who was fighting, Rebecca. Adrian, Jay and his friends are exceptionally strong in their own right." Zamasu reaffirmed. It even shocked him to an extent, seeing that Adrian and Jay, and Shona, Mace and _Zachary_ were able to manipulate ki as well as they did. It exceeded his unrealized expectations. "So I didn't have to do much in the first place."

Rebecca smiled. "Nice going, _God_."

"As much as I would like to blast all of those men out a window, this was an expensive massage salon we were in." Zamasu's hands were behind his back and he turned towards the door. "I wouldn't want to cause any damage." Even though he fixed the damage in mere minutes, but that's besides the point.

She took a step towards him. "Did they escape?"

"Rebecca, you really think we'd let them off that easily?" Zamasu turned to smirk at her as they went back into her house. "They were all down, and were sent to jail. Simple as that."

"Oh." She opened the door to their kitchen again, motioning for her dogs to come along.

"Why do you sound dejected?"

Rebecca raised a brow, then turned back to look at him. "Because… that happened to you guys. I was worried when you said you all got into a fight."

"Rebecca." Zamasu started.

" _I know, I know,_ you guys are strong enough to blow up walls and stuff like that but still, I can't help but _worry_." She undid her red hair while looking down at her counter in thought. She turned around way too quickly and Zamasu was right behind her so she nearly ended up hitting his chest. "My bad. Ooh, I gotta take a shower. If you want, you can spend more time here."

Zamasu looked at her as she skipped towards the stairs. "There is a book that I have to read more of, and I don't want to skimp out on it so soon."

Her head peeked out from the very top of the stairs. "And when have you started reading this book, Zamasu?"

"Yesterday night."

She giggled. "Fine, go on home then. I'm sure Irene's making something for the both of you."

Zamasu straightfaced. "I don't want her food."

"You've said that right before eating the breakfast that _she_ made one time." Her voice was upstairs.

"That has nothing to do with what I just said!" Technically, he was right because that was a _past_ situation, and the past shouldn't dictate present decisions. Ahem. "Just go take your shower. I'm leaving now."

Her voice was distant now, but he still heard her. "Bye Bye! Till tomorrow, we'll start again."

"Definitely." That was more to himself than anything. He gave a final goodbye to his dog children before closing his eyes getting ready to teleport into his old, nostalgic room.

"ZAMASU, WAIT!"

The Kaioshin didn't think he'd see Rebecca make a beeline down the stairs in nothing but the oversized shirt she wore during their session. Don't worry, she had undergarments underneath, we won't have that whole 'undressing you with my eyes' incident again.

The author is evil enough to put that as an actual thought process of Zamasu's.

Zamasu shook his head, the very wrong image accidentally fucking up his locomotive of thought.

"You forgot this."

She had his phone, the same one that he forgot to take with him during that Caplax voyage. Don't expect someone like him to stoop down to the likes of technology to communicate with people. "Oh." He took it and looked at the blank screen, turned it around and then stared at the screen again.

He forgot how to turn this thing on.

Okay, He figured it out in a split second but his pause was noticeable enough to make his student giggle. He narrowed his eyes at her. "What's so funny?"

She just shook her head and waved. "It's nothing, you're just old and stuff."

" _Excuse you?!_ " Zamasu placed both hands on his hips.

"Okay, _fine_ , you're not old. But go, go read your book and stuff. I'll see you tomorrow." She waved at him, and went back upstairs to take her shower. Zamasu did that annoyed pout thing he does before he looked down at his phone and then teleported out of Rebecca's home. He ended up in his room, probably the safest place he could be during the evening in Irene's home, and plopped down and placed his phone on the nightstand while grabbing his book and opening to the page he was supposed to read.

Almost instantly, he caught the scent of something _interesting_ , and it was coming from downstairs.

Okay, look… we've gone through this before, so just imagine all the doubt and dubiousness that runs through Zamasu's head of not wanting to eat her food while he's walking down the stairs with a sour look on his face as if he's being forcefully dragged into this.

"What are you making?"

Irene jumped at the sight of him, because how the heck was she supposed to know he was in her house? She's not some intuitive person that can sense people. "Uhh, hi?" She waved. "And I'm making mac and cheese. Why, you want some?"

"No."

She blinked twice, before smirking. "Bullshit."

"Watch your language."

"Language isn't something you can see."

"Do you want to get smart with me?" Zamasu shot a look at her, he couldn't hide the tiny smirk on his face.

"Maybe." Irene shrugged. "Didn't you say I was stupid before?"

"You _are_ stupid." He went to sit on the countertable's stool on the farther adjacent side of Irene.

"How am I gonna get smart with you if you think I'm stupid?" She turned around fully with a cheesy stirring spoon in her hand.

Zamasu shook his head. "You see? _That_ in itself is a stupid question."

Irene cocked her neck back. "So I am not stupid to you?" The Kaioshin groaned, not answering her question because it's pretty obvious. A chuckle escaped her lips, she turned off her stovetop and served herself a nice, steaming pasta plate of freshly made mac and cheese. She sat down in front of him on one of the countertable stools with a fork in hand before blinking and booping her own head. "Dang, I forgot my drink…"

Zamasu shook his head. "You humans are forgetful."

"You just love saying the same things, don't you?" Irene poured a glass of water from the water machine embedded in the fridge. She turned to see Zamasu's angry pouty face again and dished it off with a smile. "I don't mind though, I don't _judge_ you for it."

"You have no right to." Zamasu looked down at the countertop while she sat down, and then back at the fresh pot of mac and cheese just sitting there… all steaming and tasty looking even from this angle…

"You can't finish all of that."

"Hmm?" Irene looked up, she had macaroni in her mouth already.

"I said," Zamasu crossed his arms before standing up and going to the stovetop to look at the mac and cheese pot, "you can't finish all of this."

"Well _duh_ , I can save it for later. I'm gonna eat all of it now." Irene shrugged. "It's all for me anyway, I can take my time."

"No it's not."

Irene narrowed her eyes at the Kaioshin, but he brandished a clean pasta plate from her cabinet with a fork and started serving himself some mac and cheese, then briskly walked back to his seat and sat down. He was doing all of this with an angry look on his face, as if he was trying to spite her.

" _Are you fucking kidding me?_ " Irene started to laugh. Zamasu's eye twitched, he hated her laugh. "You could have just _told me_ that you wanted some."

"I can take care of myself." He took a bite out of his fork, restraining himself from showing that he absolutely fucking loves macaroni and cheese now.

Except Irene can tell that he did. He probably low-key missed her cooking after a single month. Ahem. "You like it, don't ya?"

"It tastes decent." He says as he takes another precious bite, _what a hypocrite._ At least he actually had the courtesy to say it tastes decent.

"Thank you." Irene bowed in her seat, making Zamasu frown. "I appreciate the compliment."

 _That wasn't a compliment, you idio-_ Zamasu shook his head and continued eating in silence. In the middle of him munching on his food, Irene started talking about what went down over the course in a month in full detail. She talked about the exhibitions, the hotels, the foods of the five accessible different countries (Zamasu was kind of in tune with that portion. _Kind of_ ), her art friends and Ashley's literary description of some of her pieces. Throughout this whole time, Zamasu assumed that she was insane or something because even someone as 'stupid' as her should know that Zamasu would tune her out as she's blabbering.

But then she started talking about her time in Caplax. She was there for a short amount of time before leaving and heading to Efilia. Crazily enough, she left on the same day Zamasu had arrived that country, perhaps luck was on his side after all. She then said that she ran into a few conflicts here and there at the time, which didn't catch Zamasu's attention.

What _did_ was the mentioning of a large scale group in Caplax that has been strangely going after many mail distribution offices all around that country. She saw it on the news; there were some unsolicited breachings of mails and emails and all those alike, and all of it was taking place for a short amount of time before stopping abruptly. Even the police departments of Caplax didn't get a chance to arrest most of the culprits because they all just up and left that quickly.

Zamasu frowned; was this connected to the black vans? Have they spread globally in the span of maybe two months? Or was this from the same group that tried to fight him and the other human males? Are they _all_ in the same group working separately but essentially together? There were way too many questions buzzing about in Zamasu's head. "When did this happen, and how long?"

Irene didn't expect him to cut her off with a question because she was in the middle of talking. "Umm, I think about twelve something days ago. And in that time it only happened for two hours before stopping."

What kind of technology do these adversaries have to wear they can _fast hack_ a global transcommunication system? This took place well before the fight at the masseuse salon, so he can't be sure if both events are tied. "Just two hours?"

"Mm-hmm, maybe less than that." Irene nodded. Zamasu has been reading about detective stuff ever since he heard about the black can crisis. It would be unfit to sling everyone to jail because from what he remembered, an _unsolicited breach_ meant that they were using re-traceable VPNs that would change constantly, so to pinpoint and grab one location would probably lead to either a suspect, or some random big guy dancing to clubby music on a music player who has no idea of this even happening. You never know with these things.

If he wanted to, he could probably attempt to teleport to Mace if he knew the man's ki signature (which isn't hard to recall for a God) and ask him what he found on behalf of the situation. He already knew Mace enough to be cool with him so, teleporting where he is wouldn't be a problem.

Unless if the guy is showering and Zamasu accidentally teleports in and- that is not a good thing to imagine. _Never mind._

"Have I caught your attention now?" Irene smiled at him, she got a second plate of Mac and cheese and Zamasu was about to criticize her for eating too much even though he got his seconds in the middle of her storytelling.

"You started saying important things, so yes, you did."

"What?" She frowned, placed her hands on her hips and leaned forward toward him. "Art exhibitions and worldly travel isn't important?"

"To you it is." Zamasu shrugged. "Have you forgotten that I can teleport to every single one of these places in a matter of seconds?"

"Right, Mr. God." Irene snapped her fingers. "Must be lucky having all that privilege."

"It is a birthright." He closed his eyes and smiled proudly. "No other species is capable of doing such feats in this universe."

That's where Irene frowned deeply. "There are people, on this planet and others, who can teleport. You know that?"

Zamasu opened his eyes. "What? Who? Do you even know this for a fact?"

"Jay can." Irene held a finger out. "His cousin can, I think Adrian can too. I don't know about Lexi, and uhh... that's about it."

"They can _teleport?!"_ This is _unheard of_ , even Zamasu was leaning forward in his seat with both hands on the table.

"Yeah?"

"Then why were they shocked when I did it the first time?"

"My guy, anyone would be shocked at some random green guy who just teleported into their room."

Zamasu's eyes were downcast and blinked at the thought. "Fair enough." That might explain why Shona didn't even jump at seeing Zamasu randomly appear back on the bleachers, perhaps the Martial Artists superactor himself knew how to do such a feat as well. It was a subtle detail that he managed to recall that day, but it said a lot. He might just be underestimating these people…

"I'm gonna go and watch something." The artist smiled at Zamasu as she walked past him, brushing a hand over his shoulder and he nearly slapped it away. "You can join if you want, unless you want to take care of yourself again."

A mockery of his words, huh? What else is new? "I'll go with the latter." Like a gentleman, he picked up his plate and placed it into the sink (he's so petty right now, he won't even do his Hocus pocus magic thing to clean her dishes in a second), walking out of the kitchen thinking about stuff.

" _You're welcome!"_ Irene leaned forward in her seat on her couch.

"Okay." What a petty response, but it's expected of the apprentice at this point. He went back upstairs to continue reading the book he was reading before he left this house. It was something regarding history, and certain people that used to live amongst the common population. It was… interesting, but the lack of information he got from this book shows that these people are still a mystery to this day.

But then again, they have only been reported to be seen a millennium ago, and they also diminished over the course of a thousand years. It was _never stated as to how they were diminishing_ , but Zamasu dished it off as the book itself not being updated to have that kind of information. The Kaioshin crossed his legs and placed the book on his lap before reaching over to grab _Endmite_ and another book named _Cause of Perspective_. He spent the whole night alone, once again reading right by his window and nightstand from the moon setting to the sun rising again. As he swapped out different books to read over the night, waves of nostalgia hit him at how he used to spend his days doing _just_ this instead of communicating with others. Turns out that considering what he did get himself into, it won't be long before he gets bored of sitting in his room all night.

And then outta nowhere, his phone rang.

He cocked his head away from the nightstand, where his phone was doing its loud shit at. Picking it up and looking at the ID in which it was Adrian, Zamasu swiped to answer the call. "Hello?"

"Are you doing anything right now?"

He cocked his neck back, looking at the screen to check the time. It was only 11:45 in the morning, and the way Adrian abruptly cut to the chase was concerning. "No… why?"

"Umm… okay." He could hear his footsteps, he could imagine Adrian traveling down the stairs while talking to him. "Remember like several days ago, when we fought and stuff like that, and those guys were sent to jail in Caplax?"

"Yes?" Zamasu frowned. "Unless if these men are at your door at the moment, then you shouldn't be sounding so worried."

"They were bailed out."

"Wait, _what?_ " This made Zamasu sit straight the heck up. "The heck you mean they were bailed?"

"You _know_ what I mean by that." The bailing system actually exist here as well. Considering the fact that all these men did was assault them, their bail would obviously not be worth so much as, say murder. But these were celebrities they tried to touch, an individual's bail alone on that part would be worth _so much more_ , and this was _forty men_. That just proves that this was indeed a syndicate of its own.

"How do you know this?"

"Mace told me. He got word of it just this morning." Adrian scratched the back of his head. "Just… letting you know."

"You're safe. Why are you so worried?" Zamasu blinked. "If they ever do anything again, then they'll just be put into jail, it's that simple. And they can't even touch you."

"Well _yeah_ but, they were after somebody." Adrian said. "And for some reason, they decide to stop and try to attack _us_. You ever thought about that?"

That is true; why did Shigeru and his little gagcircle of pseudo strongmen come after them? Sure it was a setup, yes, but _why_? "You think they were after someone we know?"

"Who could they possibly be going for? Most of our friendships aren't even that publicly disclosed." Adrian shrugged his shoulders. "And i- oh… Jay's at the door." Zamasu can hear the faint sound of some really loud and urgent knocking which caught him _and_ Adrian off guard. "Hold on. Jay- wait, what is tha-"

Jay cut him off instantly. Zamasu can hear what he was saying, including the progressively louder footsteps, and judging from the sound of his voice he was frantic. "Adrian, Adrian… listen to me. I'm not bullshitting right now…"

Adrian had to put the phone down, he didn't end the call because Jay was holding his head and pacing back and forth. Seeing him like this means that something really bad happened. "Jay, what's wrong? Are you okay?"

" _I'm fine,_ it's just… promise me you won't tell anyone what the fuck I just found because I'd… _ohhhh, shit…"_ Jay stopped pacing and placed a hand over his mouth. Adrian placed both hands on his friend's shoulders.

"Bro, tell me what the problem is! Why are you so shaken, man?"

Jay took a deep breath. Zamasu can hear all of this through the phone. "You see that luggage bag looking thing over there?" He shakily pointed at the bag that was just before the door. It wasn't moving.

"Yes?" Adrian blinked.

"I cannot _make_ this shit up, dude. I just-" He kept shaking his head. Zamasu placed the book down on his bed, completely shifting himself to lean towards his phone.  
"Jay, WHAT IS IT?!"

" _THERE'S SOMEONE IN THERE!"_ Jay continued to point as he looked up at his friend. "SOMEONE WE KNOW IS IN THAT FUCKING BAG, AND I CAN'T OPEN IT BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING LOCKED! _"_

" _What?!"_ Adrian looked back at the bag, before going to it. "Bring it in, man. Don't leave it there! How the fuck is a bag _locked?!_ Who's in it, how did you find this?!"

" _What the hell is going on over there?!"_

Jay jumped at the sound of Zamasu's voice, coming from Adrian's phone. "Zamasu, holy shit… dude, we're- I just found this bag and there is someone in there and i can't open it and get them out-" When Jay is _really_ panicky, he tends to talk too much. And he gets really anxious, but Adrian couldn't be there to comfort his friend yet.

Adrian was pulling the bag right into the living room. It _literally_ weighted a little over a hundred thirty pounds, there was _definitely_ someone in here. Kneeling over to see where Jay was able to figure out that there was a person in there. He looked all around, lifted it carefully for an obvious reason, before he caught sight of a small pouch that was velcroed closed. Adrian frowned, and pulled the opening up to reveal a plastic covering with small ventilation holes that would show what was in the bag. The second he caught sight of an actual fucking _face_ underneath that plastic covering, he dropped the pouch and looked down at the floor while placing a hand on his temple, and _froze_. "Holy fuck."

Jay looked down at his friend while holding the phone for Zamasu to hear. Adrian couldn't even look back at the bag before he uttered his response. This was a person they knew. "It's Kiran…"

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **OHHHHHH NO…. NOPE, NOPE, NOOOOO…**

 **Damn, fucking- I need to stop with these cliffhangers…** _ **I say as I leave the next chapter in another cliffhanger as well.**_

 **I'm lying.**

 **I didn't do that in the next chapter :). Or the one after that, huehue.**

 **Looks like things have gone back to normal, sort of. But now Zamasu's been more acquainted with other people. All his previous ignorant actions during the two months he stayed at Irene's house will be that of the past, he's gonna find out very shocking things about this planet and some of the people on it…**

 **And find out shocking things about himself that he never knew existed.**

 **See you all in the next one!**


	32. Way Too Much

**Why am I still writing this?**

 **I'm writing this but… I'm getting nothing from it. At all. I dunno, things have gone stale and empty here. Hnn.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Way Too Much**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

"How the fuck did you find this?" Adrian stood up. "How the _fuck_ did you find this?!"

"Dude, I.." Jay took another deep breath. Seeing something like this really shook him, he could barely compose himself to say something without scratching his head. "I was driving, and I left East City to pick up Mace earlier today. Kiran was in some large party yesterday at West City, she texted me this like… at around midnight." Jay looked down at the bag and then at the wall, then at the floor… his eyes couldn't stay on one place. "And as I was driving back to East City I saw her car just sitting all the way outside of the fucking road and it looked fine but like-and I get out just to see if she was in the car but she _wasn't_."

"Where was her car?"

"You know that route that has some buildings with tiny alleys around? _There._ Her car was real close to the trash bin I found this bag in- the bag wasn't even _in_ the trash, it was sitting right out of it, and it was windy out so that pouch thing was flying open and all I saw was her face." Another shaky breath from the Mandalan music producer. _She can't be dead… she can't be fucking dead…_

"God shit… Zamasu, we- wait… did he end the call?" Adrian looked at his phone screen. There was only his screensaver, so Zamasu did indeed end the call. A few seconds later, both music producers heard a sound before turning to see Zamasu standing right here.

The Kaioshin had _just_ teleported into their home. "Who is this Kiran pers-" Zamasu caught sight of the face in the bag. The three males did take a moment to look at it, not just because they didn't know what to do, but they needed a sign to see if she was alive.

She had makeup, her face was done up since she was at a party the night before, but it was also really _pale._ Not bluish pale, but her skin didn't have that glow it usually has, or should have. Her face itself was somewhat light purple because it was was windy and cold out, and also because she only had a few holes that only allowed the tiniest bit of air inside of the bag. The bag was big enough to fit her but it wasn't big enough for any comfortable space, so her face looked like it was pressed against the plastic covering.

Zamasu shook his head; this escalated _way_ too quickly. He knelt down and touched the bag after looking at it, and came to a relieving conclusion. "She isn't dead…"

But he said that in the most perturbed tone ever because that simply meant that this woman is alive, and considering the way the bag was, she must have been stuffed in there with her limbs at very awkward angles for a _prolonged_ period of time.

"She's not?!" Adrian said, and Jay exhaled a breath he didn't know he was holding in before running out of the living room.

"I'ma get the pliers!" Jay ran past a shelf in the living room that he actually left a pair of pliers at and his skid against the floor as he turned around because he remembered they were there. He grabbed them, went back to the bag towards the lock on the side. He placed the teeth of the pliers against the ring of the lock and pressed as hard as he could to break it open.

Abruptly, Kiran's eyes shot open and she was breathing heavily, looking all over the place frantically and making Adrian and Zamasu slightly jump. Since her face was against the plastic, her eyes weren't fully able to open and her panic increased even more.

"Bro, bro, she's awake!" Adrian looked down before kneeling over to the other side across from Jay and waving his hands above the bag so that Kiran could see him. He started saying her name and telling her that they were trying to get her out, but it didn't look like she could hear or see the music producer. Such was reasonable, but Zamasu was more worried about the fact that she was trying to move.

"Okay, Okay, Kiran, yo!" He looked into the plastic window. Kiran's hazel eyes looked like they were focusing a bit better. "I'm gonna get you out, alright?" Jay had released his grip on the lock's ring when Kiran gained consciousness, so he let the pliers grip against the lock's ring again.

For some reason, the second he gripped the ring and tried to squeeze it, Kiran started going erratic again, which made Jay frown. Even weirder was Adrian's reaction as well; his hand was resting lightly on top of the bag just below where her face was and he pulled his hand back and winced.

"What the _fuck_? This thing is _rigged?_ " Jay looked down at the pliers and back at Adrian. "You alright?"

"I'm good, I'm good, it's just…" Adrian shook his hand. "That felt like a strong short electric shock."

"...Fuck." Jay looked at the ground. 'Alright we gotta try something else, Umm… Adrian you got an extra bobby pin?"

"That lock looks _way too_ sophisticated for any of that dude, look at it." Adrian gestured to the lock; it didn't use number or letters, it used _characters_ and must be deciphered by twisting them together in a certain sequence. This is a thing they didn't know; every time Jay tried to pry this lock open, it should send an electric shock through the entire bag due to detecting its ring being pulled while it's locked. If Mace were here he probably would have been able to crack this open easily but they had to do this themselves.

Zamasu took a step forward. "Jay, move out the way."

The Mandalan looked up at Zamasu to see his hand glowing like a purple blade. "Zamasu… dude… _what is that_? Where are you-"

"I'm just going to cut the lock." The Kaioshin knelt down and with a swift motion of his hand, the lock was slided and dropped to the ground. They then opened the bag and… the way they found Kiran made them all look away for a slight moment. Yes, her arms were in awkward positions, and her legs as well. Her feet were tucked beneath her back, her right arm was behind her head and her left arm was behind her lower back, her hair looked like it was damp at one point, and there were bruises and scars all over her body. Her left ear had dried blood because her earring appeared to be ripped off, she had no shoes on, and the very tips of her fingers and toes appeared to be a little blue due to poor blood circulation and the weather. Her dress, which was once a bohemian maxi dress, was torn in several places due to being hit with something _other_ than fists in certain places.

Kiran still looked really confused, and she even attempted to move as she was hyperventilating. Adrenaline took over, she sat up way too quickly and her arms dropped limp to her sides making Jay and Adrian hold her, pulling her legs straight while trying to calm her down. Zamasu watched the sight of this, he couldn't do anything else but shake his head in distress.

"Kiran! Look, it's me fam." Adrian snapped his fingers, finally bringing her anxiety back down and Kiran looked at him with wide hazel eyes.

"Adri... Jay!" She noticeably tried to lift both her arms, but they were way too numb for her to even feel them. The same thing for her legs, which is why she couldn't even sit up on her own. Jay held her bridal style and lifted her from the bag while wincing because her body was _ice cold_. Kiran regained her breath and sniffed while being placed on the warm couch, with Adrian moving her legs so that there could be blood flow in her ligaments. She seemed to shiver at the contrast in temperature, but only her hands were involuntarily moving from the increase in blood flow.

Jay sat beside her and rubbed her back, but that made her back arch and she winced in pain. "What the fuck…" Jay looked at her back; she had several bad bruises and scars on where he touched her.

"I… I-you guys…" Kiran breathed a little before lolling slightly, she was light-headed from moving too fast earlier.

"Lemme sit with her," Adrian came back with a blanket, wrapping it around her scantily clothed body. Kiran leaned against his shoulder, slowly raising her hands to hold Adrian because he's warm. He looked at Jay "Can you brew up some tea real quick?"

Zamasu looked down at the helpless woman. She looked at him in confusion and tried to weakly raise her finger. "Who's that?"

"He's just a friend."

"I'll make the tea, Jay." The Kaioshin turned to the Mandalan who looked back at him.

"Ohhh, that's right." Jay pointed as he exited the kitchen, allowing the Kaioshin to do his magic while he went to ask kiran how the hell she ended up like this. When he reached the living room and to the couches, he saw Adrian rocking back and forth with her, patting her gently while she was quietly crying into his arm. "Kiran…"

Never in their years would they imagine seeing _her_ like this. She was always cool and composed, it broke the both of them. "What… what happened, man?"

She sniffed loudly, she was doing an ugly cry. Kiran wiped her tears and tried to gather herself as much as possible. "It's not safe… it's not safe anymore…"

Adrian frowned. "What are you t-"

"Dude, there's _somebody_ after him!" Kiran looked frantic, coming back to her senses. At this point, her body gathered enough circulation for her to grab onto Adrian's bicep. Despite the pain, and she did winced slightly, she still had to spill what this ordeal was and _why_ it happened. "I was at the party and, you know, me and my friends were perfectly fine until this one man started following me and- I didn't notice until I was about to leave."

"He followed you to your car?"

Kiran shook her head while speaking. "He followed me _inside the party_!"

"The _fuck_?" Jay frowned deeply, cocking his head back. "So… this dude- what'd he do? Did you just confront you and beat you up, and who is this he you're talking about?"

Both music producers and Zamasu got the faintest feeling that this was regarding James, and the three _hoped_ that they were incorrect. But unfortunately, they weren't. "He had other goons too, they all came when I was getting in my car. And they keep asking me if I knew James and at the time I didn't even know that dude was stalking me, but I still said no because you know, we're both famous and I don't want any problems to start. When I said no, one guy just socked me across the face and said that I was lying and that he watched me and James talk to each other."

Jay shook his head in disbelief. Adrian stayed very quiet while his friend asked the questions. "And they jacked your car afterwards."

Kiran sniffed but agreed, before pulling all of her hair to her left shoulder and leaving her neck exposed. "Pretty much."

"And then they just… put you in there?"

"They already had a bag just out there, so at first I was knocked out and when I woke up, I was facing the sky in some alley or something and being beaten before they stuffed me in there. I tried to get out but they were all strong as hell and…" she looked down at her legs. They still looked limp. "I think my legs aren't working correctly."

" _What do you mean by that?!"_ Accidently assuming the worst, Jay sat down and looked dead into her eyes with so much worry she had to lean back.

"No no no, it's not from _that_." Kiran shook her head rapidly. "While they were putting me in the bag, I remember they were getting annoyed with me trying to escape so a couple of them stepped on my legs and, they might be dislocated."

It made sense, Kiran did have her feet dragging as Adrian and Jay pulled her up and onto their couch, and she did look like she couldn't move them well even if she tried. Zamasu came back with cup of tea, he used his Shinjin leaves that grant healing; when given to any lesser being it works in the same fashion as a Senzu Bean, in which it _heals_ the body rapidly. And no, it does not exclude the factor of bone fracture, which is something that Kiran _no doubt_ has. Kiran looked at Zamasu and thanked him greatly, moving her arms a bit before reaching to grab the little cup. It was moderately hot so that she can drink it and not hold it for so long, and the moment she lowered her cup after taking her sip, she sat up and frowned.

"What's in this?" Kiran looked at Zamasu, and he suppressed a little smirk; despite the situation she was in, he figured that Kiran is generally a really nonchalant person, knowing how to keep her cool down in certain events. She wasn't downplaying her wellbeing at all. "My race is known for magical things."

Adrian looked up at Zamasu, Jay looked at him with a snort. "I'm surprised you didn't hit her up with the 'I'm a God' description just now."

"Wait, what?" Kiran furrowed a brow. "You're a God?"

Zamasu nodded. "Yes."

This was where he learned that kiran had quite the sense of humor; she leaned forward to reach out and touch his gi. And then she blinked twice and looked at his face. " _I can see you, though_."

"What is with you humans thinking that a God can't appear right in front of you?!" Zamasu gesticulated slightly.

"I mean… it's not something that happens every day, ya know."

Zamasu paused because he was about to say something. _She's not wrong_. "You know what, just _know_ that I am indeed a God."

"I wouldn't fight against that… this tea is legitimately making me feel better with every sip." Kiran looked down at the cup like it was a portal to damn Narnia. She looked at the silent music producer next to her. "Adrian… You okay?"

Adrian was… remarkably quiet. The whole situation right now hit him the most; James was his good friend, Kiran was his good friend as well, and she is far too acquainted with the both of them. Something told him that there is somebody giving out deets on behalf of who James associates with, because why the hell would they seek _Kiran_ out? And why _her_ of all people? And now that he's seeing that Kiran getting hurt served as a sort of portent, a threat to James' life… he really couldn't bear to lose someone as close as he was.

"Adrian," Kiran knew the pain the pain she was in, but she had to reconcile for this man, "I know I'm in bad shape right now, but I'm getting better. _Literally_. Don't worry so much about _me._ "

Adrian is a nice person, everyone knows this. He cares a lot about the people around him; if you try to come sideways and harm anybody, considering how strong he actually is, he will _fuck you up_. No questions asked. This was a dormant trait in him because he wasn't apt to knowing how manipulative the closest people around you are, he's seen this same vindication in high school, Jay and his damn livelihood, throughout his career… he's seen _so much_ of it. There wasn't much he could say right now because of all the possibilities that ran through his head of how sick these people might be, and what they might do next. Not to mention he had Kiran's notion in his head before she even said it; he wasn't worried about her at the moment, he was most worried about _James_ and everyone closest to him that _can't_ defend themselves. For the most part, there were only a few that he can name that _he_ knew; Irene could be a considerable target, he highly doubted any regular man could even hold a candle to Lexi, and _forget about Jay_ , or _Shona_ or _Zachary_ , regular people can't even touch them.

"Adrian."

Zamasu's voice brought him back from thinking the absolute worst. Everyone else in the room had their eyes on him, and Adrian looked up to address the God. "Yeah?"

"She's fine." Zamasu simply said. "If you're worried about anyone getting hurt, don't be. You're surrounded by people who can defend themselves."

"He's right." Kiran said. "I know I can, but not enough to tackle down a few dudes at once. But next time, I might have to take one of you with me to places."

"Are you all forgetting that I'm here?" Zamasu had his arms crossed, bringing the attention of the three mortals.

"No we're not." Adrian shook his head. "It's just… I dunno, I kinda don't want you to get too involved with these things. You're a God, aren't Gods supposed to not interfere directly with us?"

Since when the heck have we heard something like this in the story before? Adrian bought up and amazing point, and Zamasu understood that in essence, he was right. But… "I am not getting too involved. To allow such horrible things to exist knowing I have the power to destroy them doesn't sit well with me. Besides," he uncrossed his arms with a very telling smirk, "It would count as me learning more about your species, would it not?"

Adrian gave him a smile back, his friends knew they had their own backs and each others no matter what. And he loved that Zamasu had gotten cool enough with him to comfort him at a chilled out level. "I guess it would." He raised his hands a bit. "I'm… I was worrying a bit too much, maybe. Kiran, you good now?"

"Definitely." She said. She even stood up with a smile on her face to prove it, putting the empty tea cup down on the countertop. " _That_ tasted amazing, dude- uh, I dunno your name."

"Zamasu." The Kaioshin said. "And thank you."

"Nope, thank _you_." She went up to him and with much gratitude was about to hug him, because to be truthful… being in that much pain having it rectified so quickly would deem _anyone_ bearhug-worthy. But she paused. "You like hugs, right?"

Zamasu looked down at the hazel eyed woman. She's cute. "I wouldn't mind it for now." Kiran smiled widened, and she proceeded to give him this much-tighter-than-anticipated hug, making him slightly grunt from her hold. "It's moments like _this_ where I say I can be granted a hug _for now_."

She looked up at him and laughed. "My bad, I'm just… grateful and shit."

" _Language_."

"Grateful and _sheets_." Her dry humor make the Kaioshin snort. He didn't know why but this woman reminded him of Irene in a sense. Even the way he just addressed her was eerily similar to something he'd say to Irene out of irritation, and he _just_ noticed that. The guys smiled and laughed to one another, this was Kiran at her best, y'all.

"You're fine now, aren't you?"

She let go of Zamasu and looked at Adrian. "Yup. Thanks again." Kiran was looking at Zamasu, and he bid her for her gratitude.

"I'm gonna get Mace on this." Jay was busy taking pictures of the weird luggage bag and also quickly snapped one of Kiran (with her permission, of course) because her scars and bruises were healing pretty fast. Her ear would have to take some time, but judging from how quickly the healing tea was working, she would be perfectly spotless in two days tops. "He has to know; a lot of the teams he has has been on this case ever since it arises."

"The whole black van thing?" Zamasu frowned.

"Yup." Jay said, currently typing out this long winded text for Mace to see with the pictures added. "The second he returned here from Caplax with us, his people were bombarding him with info about some breach that was being down while we were there."

"I know." Zamasu nodded, making Jay and Adrian frown this time. "Irene told me she seen that stuff on the news while she was there."

"What the heck, she was in Caplax while we were there too? Dammit we should've visited her then." Adrian put his hands on his hips but started to laugh when he saw Zamasu mouth _**no we shouldn't**_.

"What matters most," Kiran said, "Is James. These people, whoever they are, are after him."

"I'm calling him right now." Adrian was already walking towards the kitchen getting his phone to make his call. "If they're gonna trifled with anybody, _best_ be with _me_."

"And me, fuck outta here." Jay shook his head. "They don't know who they're dealing with."

"And me."

The three humans turned to the God before them, and Zamasu shrugged. "What, you think I'm going to let this injustice slide?"

"True, true." Adrian shrugged, recalling that conversation they had a little over three weeks ago. He looked away and started talking to James on the other end since he had just picked up. All he wanted to know was if James was okay, he wasn't gonna tell him that he was being followed until they were to meet together again, _physically_. He didn't want his good friend to worry so much where he lives, and he doubts that anything would trifle the basketball player anyways.

He would be right, the majority of the next month is going to be a breeze for them, before everything they knew and will know will start to crumble...

 **¨·..·¨·..·¨·..·¨**

The following week held no important events for Zamasu at all; he spent his days either reading or talking with people (Ahem, Lexi and Adrian and sometimes Nousha), arguing with Irene, training Rebecca on the weekends, pretty much the same old, same old. Outside of his scope of perspective, multiple things went on in that particular span of time. Just three days after the Kiran incident, there were two individuals standing side by side one another in front of a large flat plain, the same one that Zamasu teleported Nousha into.

Nousha herself smirked at the stretch of land. From where they stood to nearing the edge of the land itself was about a mile and a half distance straight forward. This distance was quite long for some normal person who wanted a mere race.

She looked to the other individual, who was busy looking down at his legs. "So, are you ready?"

Naz gave her a look. "No _shit._ Don't get too cocky over there, I can see that smirk on your face."

"I'm not even smirking."

"Then what is that?" He pointed at her _slightly-curved-upward_ lips.

Nousha shrugged her shoulders. "Okay, now I'm smirking because your dumbass made me."

Naz frowned. "How?" Nousha shrugged, and he looked back at the stretch before them. "You know what… forget it, where do we stop?"

"You know that random pole that's about as tall as my waist all the way down there?" Nousha said. "There. That's our finish line."

"Right, right." Naz nodded. He took a step back with his right leg and Nousha did with her left. " _You_ ready?"

" _Been_ ready." Nousha smiled at him. "Three… Two… One… Go!"

The siblings dashed forward at a tremendous speed, the wind catching up with their faces. Nousha looked over to see Naz not only there, but this man was several meters ahead of her. "Hell fucking _NO_!"

Naz didn't even get a chance to register his older sister zooming past him. When he did, she was already a good 14 something meters in front of him, in which he quickly closed the space between them, snickering at Nousha once he caught up to her. At this point, their eyes were locked on the pole, the both of them now sprinting for the goal instead of just running, and then…

Nousha and Naz were so _nail-edgedly_ close to one another that at this point they both could call it a tie. Nousha took out her stopwatch a second after they both stopped running, just a couple second after they passed the pole. Her brows only raised neutrally at the amount of time they spent just running, since they both weren't trying hard at all.

"This ain't that slow." She looked at Naz, and then showed him the elapsed time they both had. Her younger brother pushed his pink hair to the side and looked.

"You're right." He nodded. "31 seconds."

"I mean, considering the fact that we weren't really _on it_ , either. That was like 'running through the park' effort."

"It's a good benchmark." Naz said. They both weren't out of breath at all. "Compared to _last_ time, that was like what? 43? 46?"

"I think it was like 45." Nousha placed the stopwatch back into her pocket. She looked back at where they started, which they both can't really pinpoint from this area. "So you see? We're both evenly matched."

"When we're not trying." Naz said. They literally drove out to the Greenyard just to prove whether or not if they were matched in speed, or if one usurped the other. To be fair, they had easy modes of transportation, for example Naz's car which is what they used (they argued all the way there too) and others, it was fun while it lasted for the both of them.

Nousha looked down. "Case settled." She turned to the end of the plains. "We're going home."

Naz muttered to himself. " _Settle my ass._ "

She turned around. "What?"

" _Wat?_ " He purposely said that comically to make his sister snort. "Let's go home, yes."

She narrowed her eyes, but decided to let it slide. Once they got in the car, she pulled out her phone to call their cousin, having a tiny conversation with him because he was very busy these past few days. As they traversed out of Greenyard and back into West City, they both took note of the police cars roaming around more often within the highways. Even the biggest investigation agency, the FPICA, had many cops and detectives just standing outside and chilling, occasionally leaving to deal with duties and then some. If one was driving past and they see _many_ police officers at the FPICA, you _know_ that serious shit has been going down.

And speaking of the FPICA, the giant building was bustling with many investigators, detectives, forensics, and AI all alike. More than half the consensus within the building had their heads wrapped around the strange coincidences happening with all these different crimes. Mace had told the others about someone being seeked out during that one day when he had to fight a bunch of annoying bad guys; they can see that the person Shigeru's crew was after was associated with him, and who other than James could they possibly be gunning after?

"James Desmond? The B-ball player?"

"Yup." Rogue looked at Mark. "I dunno, it seems pretty obvious to me. They try to corner Mace and his friends, it was all planned for someone."

"How many people?"

"It was six of them, including Mace, against forty dudes." Rogue looked down. "They weren't hard to fight, the six of them could fight very well, he told me. I asked him when this actually occurred, and he said it was near the evening during his third day in Caplax. In that time span, there was a breach in that country's mailing system. When their detectives traced some of the locations regarding this hack, it was directed towards both the Casablanc Airport on the day that Mace and his friends supposedly touched base in Caplax, and the same massage parlor that they were in just less than an hour before they left. In that time, I believe they were fighting as well."

Mark shook his head slowly, he did understand where Rogue was going with this. "But why James? What involvement does he have with them?"

"Remember that time you told me about Shona helping that one guy, Terry?" Rogue gestured as he spoke. "That Terry guy, you said, was friends with this doctor who's being targeted by these people."

"Yes, yes, you're right." Mark nodded. "Are you… saying that James might be an associate of hers too?"

That is _far_ from the fucking truth. "In one way or another." Rogue leaned back in his wheel seat. "There's no other reason to premeditate on targeting James like _this_."

"Yo _guyssss_." In comes the other AI superintendent, Bee, who flew in from the propellers in his feet with crossed arms, and an even more crossed look. He dragged the first word in his sentence. "I… came in with nulled information."

Rogue tilted his head. "Did the questioning go well?"

"Does my face look like it gone well?" Bee used a claw to point at his own face. ALl he had had to even portray an expression were the two little line that were his eyes and the rest of his face was just a black screen.

Rogue crossed his arms and tossed his head to the side. "I can't tell, there's not enough _details_ to support that."

"Red, shush." Bee held up a claw, and looked at Mark. "I overheard what you two were talking about as I came here. Just saying that yes, I did get the chance to contact Rebecca herself to ask certain questions regarding her situation." His propellers dwindled off, he plopped himself down on Rogue's chromatic desk.

"And this didn't go well, how?"

"I'll get to that. When she picked up, I asked if there were any weird mishaps around her house, workplace, places that she goes to often, etcetera etcetera. She said that… nothing has been going on." Bee waved both his arms horizontally to gesture that. "Everything has been fine ever since her last bout, which was that annoying box, I found that really weird. Now, when it came to the other things; I asked her if she knew or had any associations with James or anyone she knew. She said 'No', she does not know James at all, or any of his friends. Everything after that rendered most of her answers elusive."

"Huh." Rogue nodded. "So, she simply wasn't giving a good testimony, Blue?"

"Pretty much." Bee shrugged. "The woman didn't even ask on behalf of the criminals themselves, which is something that most people who were targeted do. It was as if all of that stuff that occurred with her didn't even take place, nor did it seem serious to her at all."

Mark looked down at the ground. He only met Rebecca once; from seeing how she didn't react to Terry getting hurt, not to mention _not_ visiting him to see if he was okay, was all shady in itself. Especially because Terry made it seem like the two of them were in a reliable friendship, but from what Mark can see, that looked falsified as hell. "You left it at that?"

" _Nope_." Bee shook his head. "I'm hungry for answers, that woman was too dry for this, so Mace contacted James for me." Bee went to the edge of the table to sit down and allow his legs to swing gently. "He said that he wasn't directly affected, and he knew of the fight that occurred, but nobody shady came up to him at all in all this time. He told me that he and his friends did not get anything until one of them found a fellow singer trapped in a locked bag, this was outside James' general involvement. I asked if he knew who Terry was, and he said no. I asked if he knew Rebecca… and he said that his girlfriend is her best friend."

"Wait… _what_?" Mark frowned. "If that's the case then Rebecca obviously would know who he is!"

"Aside from his fame factor, and unless her best friendship isn't friendship at all." Rogue stood up and went to the large compiled folder shelves to lean against it while looking through the files. "That's strange."

"I asked for more details on whether or not they have actually communicate, and James said that they have spoken with one another very often in the past, but not so much right now." Bee's face portrayed a frowning expression.

Rogue cocked his neck back. "Why would Ms. Granger lie about that?"

"Another note; she sounded really annoyed the more I asked about James." Bee shook his head. "Maybe she doesn't like him enough to acknowledge his existence. That's… that's petty."

"This is a serious matter," Mark shook his head. "She may not want to be involved with anything involving anyone else."

"How would she be involved other than us trying to connect the dots to this whole mess?" Rogue looked at Mark. "She's just basically a… not even an _alibi_ , we need to know if they are singling out the people she knows."

"And why would they do that?" Mark furrowed a brow.

"It's the kind of thing that organized syndicates do when they are both acknowledged, and when they are dealing with someone of status." Bee looked at Mark. "What occured in the Seven Years could hold testimony for this; officers will seek out those closest to the target that they want to exact and make sure that they make it obvious that they've committed a crime on them, in order to keep the opposers distracted and on their toes. The more attention they put on the 'fodder', if you will, the likelihood of them taking down their target increases."

Mark was surprised. "How did you come up with that?"

"Blue used to be a _spybug_ back then, during the War. His body was that of a tiny tenebrionid, hence his first surname." Rogue was talking about Bee, the both of them refer to each other and their closest AI friends in terms of color. It's an AI thing that they shared. "This was the stuff that high-end officers, commanders, and hitmen did. To the common consensus, it sounds like an easy way to get caught but, we're dealing with something that has an _incredibly_ high amount of disposables. This same line of thought can't done with a crime syndicate that is only citywide, there wouldn't be enough expendable people to cover up for their scheme."

This is the benefit of having two superintelligent war veterans as high-tier superintendents. They can always figure out stuff like this rather quickly. "Damn… now, the only difficulty with this _pinpointing_ where the source of this is."

"Exactly, at this point, we've spoke about this before and Mace agrees; the more they continue with these crimes, the more coverage we have on behalf of where they could be, where this originated, and how we could take them down completely." Rogue and Bee, and pretty much everyone in the FPICA function to take down very large scale crimes like this. They only focus in on the source and what gives them evidence on the source of a problem, because that's the biggest Achilles heel in any organization, whether good or bad.

Unless if your organization is wealthy and smart enough to self-run despite you not being there for a prolonged period of time.

Mace entered the room, he was holding a mini glass jug with iced tea in it. He greeted them kindly. "My supers, my detective…"

"Our director." Rogue snap-pointed his fingers at Mace. "How many are on right now?"

"Fifteen." Mace said. "You two will be filing in for another one." He was talking about supervising cases, which were both Rogue and Bee's jobs. "And Mark, I'm putting you on the Helvine case."

The Helvine incident occurred a week ago; it was reciprocated in the same fashion as the transmission breach, except it didn't affect Caplax as a whole. It was much smaller, but so much information has been dataleaked to an unknown source. They have yet to figure out where this source is. The data has been recovered fortunately. Rogue looked downwards while going back to his office chair to sit. "That makes seventeen superintendents. Hnn."

Don't think a superintendent is looking over _one_ specific group of investigators and detectives. These guys hold a countrywide and nigh-global scale of the groups involved in solving a case, that means Rogue and Bee can manage over a hundred assorted teams a _piece_. And of the many detectives alive right now, Mark also has the privilege of being acquainted with both Rogue and Bee _and_ the director himself.

"Mace," Mark looked at Mace, "You told us about the person your cousin had stumbled upon; Kiran Lys is her name, right?"

"Yes."

"Did she… mention James' name at all?" They needed this clarification, now that Mace wasn't busy.

"That was the _first_ thing Jay mentioned to me. He said that what happened to her was because they wanted to get to James. He was at the party, but he left early before the men could get a hold of him, and they turned their attention to Kiran, who was with him in that party occasionally. They pestered her about whether or not she knew James and that was when she figured that they were following her throughout the large club. They were _indeed_ after him."

"Now _there_ is a bone picker!" Bee tapped his claw against the table. Turns out his earlier hypothesis was correct. "Along with Terry, James and Kiran are targets because of this young woman."

"No no…"

The two superintendents and the director looked at Mark, who had his finger against his chin. "Single out James from that; both Terry and Kiran were used as 'fallbacks', red signals for both James and Rebecca. The way this fight was set up would mean that James is the true target, just like Rebecca is, and Kiran, like Terry, were just false flags to distract everyone else from who they really want."

Rogue spoke up. "But why are _those two_ singled out if they don't know each other?"

"Who doesn't know each other?" Mace asked.

Rogue turned to him. "James and Rebecca."

"Oh no, they know each other."

"That's what James told me." Bee said.

"No, like, they _know_ each other. They've had… other relations before." Mace said, courtesy to Jay's stories and _experiences._ "Why would you say that those two are nescient of one another?"

"Rebecca says she doesn't how James or anyone he associates with."

Mace had a deep frown on his face. And it deepened as he recalled what happened to his cousin a few years ago. "...Why would she say that?" He placed his hands on his hips. "Why would she deny knowing him?"

"Probably over something petty, but since we know James knows her, and your cousin knows James and Rebecca then… I think we know who to go with best." Bee shrugged. "Maybe the next searches will provide more context, but I would keep a _close eye_ on the people you interact with. That goes for you and Mark." The tiny AI pointed at the both of them. "There's something peculiar about you guys' group of friends."

"Well, not _them_." Rogue had to reconcile what Bee said. "But what's going on in them." That made Bee's little lined eyes swivel horizontally, as if making a straight face.

"He gets it, Red."

Rogue held up two hands. "Hey, just making sure."

Mace chuckled at the two. "Alright y'all, crunch time. Get in your teams, my SPs, and Mark, you're gonna be with B.A."

"Right." Mark nodded, and walked out of Rogue's office with Mace. The two AIs followed suit, they both looked at each other.

Bee floated until he was at 'eye' level with Rogue. "You remember what Yellow said, right?"

"Yup, he's got a meeting with all of us about two weeks from now." Rogue swung his head at Bee. "Do I look like I forget?"

Bee raised his claws in the same fashion Rogue did. " _Just making sure._ "

Rogue's red light that went through the middle of his face as a narrow line blinked before he shook his head as they went to their relays. "Smart ass…"

†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†

Just nine days after Kiran had been recovered by her friends, Adrian was once again sitting in his studio spending his time making a song that just randomly popped into his head. He would call Kiran periodically or every other day just to see if she was fine, and she indeed was, although she stated that it's been weird to get into something like that and then not have anything happening afterwards. That was a good thing on her part, that she wasn't getting bothered with.

He and Jay contacted James a few times, and the basketball player said that he was contacted by the FPICA over the possibility of someone being after him. This happened after he had learned of what these bastards did to Kiran, and when he was contacted by Bee he gave the details of what occured him, he sounded like a really regal chipmunk to James. But he didn't discriminate, that said person was _part_ of the FPICA; they don't play no games. James assures that there is nothing going wrong around him and all, no one else has been affected ever since. He even called up Irene to ask if everything was alright, and his girlfriend much to her confusion said that nothing was wrong. He didn't explain such a thing to her, because he didn't want her to worry, and he of course called Zamasu to ask if everything was fine with _everyone_ , since he knew Zamasu's been places.

Adrian and Zamasu had a conversation, which later turned into a three way-convo with Ashley. She unveiled the surprise of the gang going to a winter resort in less than two weeks from now, and Adrian was more than elated at the idea. Zamasu did agree on going, and he also asked Ashley if she wrote _Cause of Perspective_ , and found out that she did. So while he was texting the couple, Zamasu and Ashley had a separate chat (which was of course made by Ashley, you really think Zamasu knows how to do that advanced shit?) and they spoke about the book and what it entailed.

 _Cause of Perspective_ was based on one ongoing era that affected random, completely different people at the same time, and it went into detail about their point of views on the subject. Said era was that of a wartime, where everyone's brain was either scattered, shut off, or imploded brutally by the reality of the world around them; there were perspectives of people in the war, people of the war, the victims, the witnesses, and those who weren't a part of it at all, and all of this intrigued Zamasu greatly. He asked her what sparked her to write this, and she admits that what happened in the Seven Years was what made her pull out something like this. It was actually a best-selling book for a while too, with great commentators who said it was a wonderful work of art, and Zamasu could agree mostly because he felt the same way as… _everybody_ in that book. Regardless of what perspective it was, he found that he could see a piece of his own thoughts within everyone, including the optimistic 'war will be over' person who can't help but smile her way out of the fire and flames and death around her. It was a dark story in essence, but enlightening overall.

Adrian and Zamasu spoke about… _fighting_ , because Zamasu was interested in what this man and his friends could even do. Adrian did say that he can instantly transmit his body from one place to another but only at a very small range. By very small, Zamasu found out, was about 100 meters in any direction, which was impressive in his eyes. He reckons Jay could do much more than that and he could enact it much faster than he could, and Shona is even faster than _that_. Adrian couldn't do much when he's not trying obviously, but from that one time he and Jay sparred, the actual sparring room they previously had was blasted open on one of its walls. Said sparring room had walls that can withstand the force of six rocket launchers pinpointed on _one_ point of the wall, so Zamasu can consider them both to be quite strong. He asked how they learned all this while being so young, and Adrian told him that self defense classes are a thing globally. Yes, martial arts is a part of the curriculum in schools in this planet.

The only way Zamasu can truly test this is if he gets Adrian, Jay, _and_ Shona to take him on at once. They were no match for him, as he thought.

Later that night, Zamasu flew out towards the farthest North of the city, and during this time Terry was just leaving hospital. His shift was done, and he had autoheated his car to keep it from getting too cold twenty minutes before he left (as of now, the weather went from being cool to mostly chilly nearing the night). He stepped in, turned the ignition on, and peeled out of the hospitals parking lot and into the tech-savvy streets of South City. The street lights were incandescent, they gave off a warm white glow to the road, especially because it was mostly clear in the areas that Terry drove through.

He debated on going to Rebecca's house, or even calling her to chat with her for a bit. She was at work today, but even then they didn't exchange much she was unusually busy today, or at least that's what he was told. As of lately, she hasn't said much to him for a while and when he'd call her she'd either be out, or busy. Mark called him in the middle of that thought fest to ask how he was doing, and offered him to a chilled night out at a leisure restaurant after a long day of work.

That was considerate of him.

He parked just in front of said place that Mark invited him to, and they greeted each other and walked in to order a nice meal and sat to chat with each other about random shit. Not once was Rebecca mentioned, but they spoke about the cases that Mark had to be apart of to solve, and funny things that went on behind the FPICA, and Terry talked about his fellow bros at 's. They spent an ample amount of time just being friends, and pushing the annoyances and worries to the side for a moment.

Ethan just left Rose Corp, his shift was also done for the night. He gave his farewells to Chandler, Evan and Ambrose when he had to leave, and exited the building feeling less uppity than he did on his first, and second days working there. He was still uppity, don't get him wrong, but less so. Walking out of the place was like exiting a wonderland, and turning around to look at the building was like looking at some colossal giant beauty that looked heavily imposing. He _still_ can't believe that he's working here, and he can't believe that the people here were cool as heck, pretty much everyone was amicable with one another, and the way they communicate just shows that intelligent minds can sit in one place together, regardless of cultural and ethical differences. Ambrose, his boss, was such a sweetheart, and the interactions he has with Chandler, Avery, and Evan, the guy who's been here since the _launch_ of this corporation, were endearing as heck.

He had left his car out on the street in front of the Corp, since there was an open parking space there. He was wearing some really old but kind of durable jacket for this weather, and slacks with his dress shirt. When he got to the parking spot, however, there was nothing there.

Maybe he was going _crazy_ , because this was the _exact spot_ he left his car in, and it's not there anymore! He looked at the left end of the street, then to the right end, and then took out his phone to track his own car down. Evan told him about an app that can be used to track your car, and also turn on/off any non-engine requirements, like the heat or AC just in case if you don't want your car to be a tundra on a winter night. When he saw where his car was, he did a triple take…

It was back at his house, and it's been there since 3:50 today, which was about two hours after he got out the car and into Rose Corp.

There was only one obvious candidate for this fuckery, and that was his girlfriend. She knew he now worked at Rose Corp, and she was with a friend in South City earlier and probably took his car to drive herself back home. Ethan sighed in despair, it was _way too cold_ to opt for the train, the train station itself was a forty minute walk from _here_.

"Ethan?"

Ethan turned around to see the very veteran himself, who was going the other direction before spotting the newbie looking really depressed about something. The man turned to the agriculture specialist. "Hey, Evan."

"Yo." Evan approached him. "What's up? You look anxious."

"Umm…" Ethan scratched the back of his; this is gonna sound hella pathetic. "My car, uhh… my girlfriend took it and drove herself home earlier."

Evan furrowed a brow. "How?"

"She was in South City with a couple of friends this afternoon, and probably took my car from then on." Ethan looked down.

"Have you tried calling her to come get you at least?"

See, that's the problem with this whole situation. "She's not apt for that. She would argue with me up and down until I got tired, and it's way too cold to do such a thing."

Evan made a 'hmmm' sound, he honestly would have been the type to straight force his girlfriend to come and pick him up if she pulled some shit like this. Ethan on the other half had a sullen face. "I gotta walk to the train station, I'll see you tomorrow."

"I can drive you home."

Ethan turned around slowly to face Evan. Such an offer was very kind of him despite only knowing him for the three days he has worked here. "Um, man I really don't- I mean you don't _have_ to do that-"

"Ethan, it's like negative six million degrees out." Evan gestured around him. "I got you, dude, you don't need to worry. Lemme just go get my car."

"But don't I have to pay you juice-money?"

 _Juice-money_ is the incorrect term to use for paying someone with a hybrid car to drive you somewhere, since hybrid cars are used everywhere in this planet. It's a similar term to someone having to pay 'gas-money' for a ride, but Evan decided to let it slide. "You don't. You can follow me or you can wait here until I come through."

Ethan decided to wait, and Evan walked much faster than normal to get to his car. He peeled out of the parking lot a minute or so later with this beautiful, sleek chrome black car with pretty neon lights as accents around the cars, and they _change color_. It hovered above the street's surface, and the underneath portion of it had lights as well. "Get in."

Ethan just stared at the whip before him, _gosh dang that looks amazing…_ Evan had to snap his fingers with a chuckle to get the man's attention, and Ethan decided to slip into the car. The car was snazzy, the interior was comfortable and soft and warm because it was preheated, and Evan was smart enough to do that. Ethan told him where he lived and apologized for how long of a ride it was.

"Did you personally move your house into West City?"

"No."

"Then why are you apologizing?" Evan gave him a little smirk, and Ethan lightly chuckled.

"I have a bad habit of doing that."

Evan nodded. "I know the feel, man."

"Really?" Ethan frowned, and Evan nodded. "But you're really confident. All of you guys are, you guys are authoritative voices."

For some reason, Ethan's been using words he doesn't normally use lately. Evan shrugged his shoulders. "I used to be like that; I couldn't go a dang day without saying sorry but that changed. It kind of… vanished into thin air, that whole habit. I didn't even realized it was gone until I started pioneering in agriculture."

"How old are you?" Ethan looked at Evan; the man looked really young to be holding the reins to a large sector in Rose Corp. In fact, _Avery_ looked young too, and _Ambrose_ looked like he younger than Ethan.

"I'm thirty seven." Evan said, and took a moment to glance at Ethan's dumbfounded face. "Yep, I know, I look young don't I?"

"Everyone does." Ethan said. "Even that old professor guy that Ambrose was walking with the other day, he looked really young too."

"That guy, Sr. Mastiff, is in his _sixties_ , Ethan." Evan chuckled. "I think you're conflating that with how we act, because Mastiff is a jovial person almost all the time. Living like we're not aging somehow makes us not age."

"That's… amazing." Ethan looked to the highway they just reeled into. It would take another twenty something minutes to get home, and in that time Ethan ended up learning a whole lot about Evan, like the fact that he's been in this agriculture business for sixteen years, starting right after he graduated from college and then working with Ambrose seven years into his own career. Ethan was fresh out of college himself, he graduated last year in literature but he struggled a lot in the option he chose.

"You know how lucky you are to have a job here?" Evan said. "It's rare that people your age end up working so close to Ambrose. I mean, discount Avery, he's only in his early thirties."

"He is?!" Ethan's eyes widened. "He looks younger than me!"

"He... _nah,"_ Evan exited the main highway, he was now within the edge of West City, and Ethan's house was just five minutes away at this point, "You still have a baby face."

"W- no I don't?" Ethan shook his head, before looking back at Evan. "What do you mean by that?"

"You have a young look about you." Ethan gestured with his right hand as he spoke. "Avery is young looking but your face is a lot more… I dunno, it holds more youth. Ambrose is the same way too, and that man is only thirty."

"HE'S _THIRTY?!_ " Ethan did know that Ambrose was young, but he thought this man was like 25, looking like a 20 year old. His jovial boss was only twenty years away from being middle aged… _That's riveting…_ The humanoids of this planet have longer average lifespans, so they don't consider anyone middle aged until they hit their mid 50s. The life expectancy is above 100 at the moment for normal people.

"You'd think that Ambrose was forty or something?" Evan frowned. "Why are you so shocked?"

"He looks way younger than that." Ethan shook his head. "Like, a whole de _cade_ younger."

Evan shrugged in agreement. "That's his family genes, and diet. The guy is a very healthy man."

Ethan would definitely agree with that; Ambrose's toned physique was perfect, he didn't even suffer from that _millionaire's gut_ thing that most CEOs do(where you become rich, and you just get bloated and shit. That happens). Ethan wasn't fat himself, but you could tell he slacks a little on behalf of his diet. "But you all look really healthy."

That comment made Evan chuckle a bit.

"No seriously, every person, even the regular people who work here, everyone looks so fresh faced and healthy." Ethan looked like some wondrous kid how was talking about stepping into a toy mine. "Is that a thing? Does he hire only attractive people?"

Now that made Evan cackle. " _Heck no_ , he doesn't discriminate at all. It's just that Rose Corp is a place that… well, influences you to become better." Evan gave Ethan an indecipherable look. "I used to be chubby, like the first month I worked here."

"Really?" Ethan really can't see that in Evan now. Evan's physique was athletic and toned too.

"Yup." Evan parked right in front of Ethan's house and looked across the road. "You were right. Your car is right there."

Ethan leaned forward to see his car on the other side of the road, which didn't make sense to him. Why park it _across_ from his house? "Oh…" He brushed a thought away before looking at Evan again. "But you were chubby? I can't see that at all."

"Mmhmm. Until -and this is where I _reckon_ Ambrose's influence rubs off on anyone, not even a year into working there I started eating healthier and working out more and didn't even realize the amount of productivity I had while being there." Evan shook his head. "...Okay, well most of that is because the food courts have the most amazing food that's healthy as hell and," he clasped his hands against his thighs, "... Well, yeah."

"You're not lying though. When I first went there I didn't wanna leave because the food was just…" Ethan shook his head, remembering the three dishes he had on his first day before leaving. _Gosh, they were so good_.

"Yeah." Evan was looking downward, and Ethan caught the expression on his face. He had this smile, looking as though he was thinking about Rose Corp and nothing but happy memories came up for him. Ethan cracked a smile too, because seeing someone smile like that in thought was heartwarming. The specialist shook his head gently with the reminiscencing smile still there. "Working there changes you, trust me, you'll become a completely better person working here for less than a year." Evan smiled.

"Better, or different?" Ethan frowned.

Evan pressed a button to unlock the car doors. He looked at Ethan with a smile. "For you, different _is_ better."

Ethan blinked and looked down in thought, but Evan patted him against the shoulder to assure that what he meant wasn't negative at all. He gave Ethan a farewell by saying 'See ya around, kiddo', and Ethan returned the bid before getting out of the car and watching Evan drive off with that sleek ass car, and finally looking back at his house.

He almost… didn't want to leave. He found that bit of interaction he just had with Evan… endearing, the man was kind and funny and positive. He hasn't had something like that in a long time, it was brotherly in a sense even though Ethan was an only child. He kind of didn't want to leave Rose Corp either, just because he liked hearing the small chats Chandler and Evan and Avery have, along with seeing his boss interact with them and the others as well. He doesn't even have to attempt to communicate with them because they were very open and chill, that didn't happen at his last job. To see the very people at the very top not being stuck up scumbags like how many people view them was eye opening.

Excluding Ambrose from that whole _scumbag_ trope, because any time his name is brought up everyone has positive and wishful things to say about him. The man has that magnetic charm, Ethan can see that all over him. He took a deep breath and brandished his keys from his pockets. He had another range of hours before tomorrow, which was at 11:30PM. Ethan opened his door and took his jacket off...

He seriously could not wait until then.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **You know what's weird? Remember when people started sending shady shit Rebecca's way? Why has it suddenly switched up to impacting** _ **James**_ **now?**

 **This chapter is highlighting how pliant and calm everything seems to be after a certain incident, and how others and their lives are going at the moment...**


	33. A Break From Reality

**YOU THOUGHT THIS WAS GOING AWAY?! Pffft…**

 **It's not. Trust. The Winter resort starts today.**

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 **A Break From Reality**

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Insula... Was huge, Zamasu hadn't realized how big this large stretch of forest was, and wondered how in the hell the plant life succeeded this well after less than a century after the Seven Years War. The trees looked like they have been freshly around for more than three centuries, some even reaching heights of fifty feet in the air, and they were gleaming beautifully in the night with green, healthy grass. The wildlife in this large forest was mostly small animals, like that black and white bunny that kept riddling with the Kaioshin the first time he ended up here.

He decided to land within the forest, just a few hundred feet away from the actual giant abode that resided in Insula. Here, he found that there was actually a dark dirt path that was wide enough to fit the weird looking trucks in. There was another path that was perpendicular to that other path, and that one was horizontal to Zamasu's sight. There were also footsteps that looked somewhat fresh, about couple minutes old, that could belong to none other than Ambrose himself. He didn't think the man had a jogging routine, but thinking about the way his physique was, Zamasu reconciled that thought with merit. He followed that trail for a short while, and would have to say that perhaps there were random places where Ambrose would step lighter than normal, because he did not see another footprint for another ten feet in front of him. Or perhaps the light breeze in the air blew against the path to bury some of those footsteps away.

Why was he looking at footprints in the ground like this? He didn't really know.  
Zamasu had more courtesy than you'd think, so he decided not to directly teleport into Ambrose's home. Instead, he stood just in front of the very savvy home, once again finding himself staring at the beautiful flowers around his place. This particular portion of Tycho was always somewhat tropical, so it was rarely ever chilly nor did it snow up here. He would have to say Ambrose picked a great place to live in since plant life seemed to be bustling like nothing here. The lights were off in the man's house, and from the footprints Zamasu saw Ambrose was obviously out jogging. The Kaioshin debated on finding a ki signature around here so he could at least track where this man was, but he realized that Ambrose didn't have a different ki signature like either Naz or Nousha.

In fact... He couldn't pinpoint a ki signature of Ambrose at all.

A ki signature has a certain distance in which it can be detectable to him; remember when he teleported to Lexi when she was in a different country? Yup, he used her ki energy to locate where she was, and he could only do that because her ki level was rather high. It is partially synonymous with how powerful a person's ki is and apparently, Ambrose was weak.

Zamasu shrugged, the trope in which James depicted him as wasn't that much off.

He sat down on one of the cushioned lawn chairs on his patio, why is everything in this place so damn comfy? Zamasu could sleep here if he wanted to, but he was waiting for the man in question because umm... Because he wanted to? Zamasu was still iffy on behalf of why he's so interested in hi-

OH Actually, he wanted to ask Chandler some questions, and if Chandler isn't here then he can fill that time in with Ambrose of course.

He could tell that Chandler wasn't here, he didn't see that sleek looking car at that tinier house that belonged to him, not unless he parked it somewhere else. From where he sat, he could see the front of Chandler's house, it was a few hundred feet away from Ambrose's. He wondered why that would be the case, though; wouldn't that mean that either one of them would have to walk such a long distance or drive every time they'd have to physically meet up with each other? Maybe they both enjoy long walks, and much of this place is mostly open grassland. Quite an aesthetic though, Zamasu liked how natural and roomy it was. He heard footsteps coming from one end of the house, and he assumed that that was Ambrose. Turning to the far left to see him turning the corner, and yes his earlier hypothesis of Ambrose going out for a jog was corre-

Hold on… no, no seriously wait a minute; the footprints Zamasu saw had been there for only a couple minutes before Zamasu came. That same trail was several miles, or even more, away from where he stood now, and he had only sat here for less than three minutes. Either he timestamped the footprints wrong, or Ambrose has some form of weighted shoes on.

Why was he overthinking this again?

Ambrose had his long hair in a loose low ponytail and was wearing a navy blue jumpsuit that hugged in the right places oh so well, it was made of a fabric that looked like velvet, but was made suitable for exercising. The fact that this jumpsuit was meant to hug the body accentuated his pecs and abs and biceps, his thighs and legs were given justice with this one suit and because he has a lean and toned build, the slight curvature of his body was prominent as well. He looked down at the Kaioshin and waved while approaching the front door, which was conveniently across from and behind Zamasu. "Hello."

Zamasu frowned… he said that as if he knew I was here... "Hello." He stood up and turned around because Ambrose was already at his own door as Zamasu's eyes were on him, and he ended up just standing there for a long moment before moving.

Have any of you, any of you, ever seen someone whether it be a guy or girl, with an ass so nice that you had to stop what you were doing to look at it? That's what Zamasu did, by accident.

The trillionaire opened his door, and the lights automatically turned on. Zamasu shook his head, damned technology… "I was out jogging, just letting you know since I dunno how long you've been sitting there."

"I can tell." Zamasu approached the opened door, intuitively knowing he was invited in. "You sweat so delicately."

That was an offhand comment he had to make, because Ambrose did sweat very delicately. He didn't look gross at all, and he didn't look like he was out of breath or pacey. This man has good stamina. Ambrose turned around to give him a weird look. "Thank you? Is that a compliment?"

"I don't even know."

The rich man chuckled. "Okay…" he went to close his door and gestured for Zamasu to sit on his couch. " I don't want you to sit and talk with me when I'm all sweaty and stuff, I need to take a shower."

For some reason, Zamasu wanted him to walk around in his presence more while he stayed here. Don't ask why, it totally has nothing to do with his attire. "You can. I can wait right here, unless you take a hour to clean yourself."

Ambrose made a small sound before averting his gaze and looking downcast with his lips slightly pouted, because he's kinda guilty for staying in the shower too long. He raised a finger, Zamasu found his antics cute. "I'll be quick."

Zamasu watched him fast walk out of the living room and into this hallway that supposed led to where his shower should be. There were no stairs in this house, Zamasu assumed everything was on one floor. He reclined back against the couch he was sitting on and closed his eyes doing what Ambrose advised him to do…

And that's when his curiosity piqued.

He looked around the house, the modest yet insanely tech-savvy living room and kitchen were all an aesthetic. He went into the kitchen to look at all the stuff, even opening his fridge to see what Ambrose has. There was legitimately nothing but certain fruits and vegetables, essential sauces that needed refrigeration, and other various plant-based things. Zamasu raised his brows, he didn't think Ambrose ate nothing but plant based food at all. There were these little bars that were in silicone cookie mats, those little bars were homemade dark chocolate. Zamasu fought the urge to snatch and snack on one, shutting the fridge before his hand could do otherwise, and he went to various portions of the house.

The house in essence was very simple, there was no extra lounging place or a bookshelf, the dining room was even simple looking aside from the floating dining table chairs. There was a pad against the wall that he assumed controlled the lighting in the room and he went to it and lowered the small lever. The lights faded beautifully when the lever was brought down, and then came back brightly when he brought it up, and he did this multiple times like a little kid. There was another button next to the light switch that was in a different language, but Zamasu deciphered it as 'Pong Table'.

He didn't know what a Pong was, so his curious ass pressed it and heard a low vibrating sound coming from behind him. He turned to the dining table to see that its chromatic surface was opening up, revealing a large black platform that was covered by glass, apparently this dining table's top surface was made of some form of super clean glass too. The farthest edges of the table lowered to reveal a toggle board with a circular, glowing joybutton on each end and other red and white pulsing buttons, and a bunch of other-colored buttons lined up together which are meant to change the player's color. The platform had a white glowing line in the center with two tiny rectangular pieces located where the toggle boards were.

Zamasu blinked like eight times. "What in the hell…" What level of sorcery is this?

It looked like a magical portal unfolded right before his eyes. He speculated the amazing ping pong table with intrigued but confused eyes, how does one just make this so inconspicuous? Why is he asking that question, it's already revealed that Ambrose was super freaking smart. He went up to one of the toggle boards, seeing there were two buttons at the very top, but they were all flat. In fact all of the buttons were flat, how could you press these buttons if they're flat?

Zamasu's old-fashioned ass didn't think to realize this was a touch screen board at first.

One of the buttons said 'COM', which Zamasu obviously didn't know what that was, so he tapped it like a genius. The button itself flicked off for a nanosecond before three more came up right below that one in front of his eyes. He cocked his neck back, seeing that the three respectively said Easy, Medium, and Hard. To the rest of us, this ping pong table obviously came with a computer match for someone to play this thing alone, but Zamasu decided that he shouldn't tamper with this thing because a) he didn't know what ping pong was, and b) this table might explode into a billion pieces if he pressed any one of those buttons, he doesn't know how this tech stuff works.

Zamasu went to that wall pad and pressed the same button to watch the table sequence again, and he left the dining room and curiously went through the hallway the same way Ambrose went. Now he could pick up very faint sounds of a shower with his amazing hearing, but even then he could tell this house was expertly insulated. It wasn't loud enough to be deciphered from silence, so he couldn't tell when Ambrose would be done or not unless he went to his door and placed his ear on it. That's creepy.

The Kaioshin didn't think this hallway would lead to an outside door. The doors on the adjacent walls were all room doors, there were only a few of them. He saw one that was partially open, he could see the navy blue carpeting that looked really soft, and a bed with several pillows neatly placed together by the headrest. The walls looked to be this light indigo color that went well with the floor. Zamasu didn't feel compelled to go in the room, but it looked beautiful from where he was.

The door behind him opened as Zamasu was backing away to turn around and leave. He nearly bumped into Ambrose, and he jumped back because he was too close to the man now. "Sorry-"

Ambrose's hair was damp, not dripping wet but still well saturated and healthy, his eyelashes were wet so that brought out those beautiful gold irises even further. He was wearing a black robe that showed just the very bit of his chest and his clavicles. The engineer blinked twice, he didn't feel the need to raise his hands over nearly colliding with Zamasu.

Instead, he frowned. "Didn't you say you'd wait in the living room for me?"

"I did." Zamasu nodded, the Kaioshin straightened himself again.

Ambrose tilted his head and smirked. "And how did that go?"

"It went very well." Zamasu spoke as if his green ass was on the living room couch right now. Obviously, he was bantering a little with Ambrose because he found… entertainment in that.

"Sure." The engineer walked past him, and damn he smelled good. "Wait here, right here, while I change."

"I'll try." Zamasu said, seeing Ambrose shoot a look at him before closing his room door. Zamasu did stand there and wait until Ambrose opened his door again, wearing a simple pair of black joggers and a cozy sweater. He motioned for Zamasu to follow him back into the living room. He himself went into the kitchen, turning his head slightly to address the man behind him.

"I heard noises coming from the dining room, what did you do?"

"How did you hear that?!" The Kaioshin didn't even attempt to deny Ambrose's claim. A few minutes ago, Zamasu could barely hear any noise from the bathroom in the dining room, how did Ambrose pick it up?

There was a bit of a pause for a moment because Ambrose was crouching behind the counter tabletop and taking something out so Zamasu couldn't see his face. "Technology."

Zamasu flailed a shrug. "Of course." He sat down on the couch and propped his leg against his knee. The Kaioshin dismissed his earlier concern for Ambrose's hearing after that simple response. "What are you doing over there?"

"I'm making something." Ambrose popped right back up with a bag of something, turning around to place it on the countertop. "I'm hungry."

"What exactly is it?"

"Carrot Soup." Ambrose said, he was already chopping the carrots up as he spoke. Zamasu frowned. "With tumeric."

"That's… not going to fill you up." The Kaioshin furrowed a brow. "You just finished running."

"It will, trust me." The engineer smiled. "The last thing I'd ought to do is eat a lot after exercising, Zamasu."

Zamasu crossed his arms. "I figured that." He kept his eyes closed, and the room went silent again, minus the sound of Ambrose cooking of course. Zamasu realized that the engineer was getting invested into making this particular dish, even though his back was turned to the God Zamasu can see he was being very attentive and that was… thoughtful. Soon, all the vegetables and things were brewing soundly on the stove, and Zamasu caught the alluring scent very quickly.

"Is that for the both of us?"

That was more of a statement than a question. Ambrose still answered him anyway. "What, you want some?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you say so beforehand?" Ambrose made about enough to serve like six people, so giving Zamasu a serving wouldn't be a problem with him. He just found it amusing that Zamasu only asks for food when it's being made rather than the latter.

"Because you should know that I would want some already." Zamasu's response was adamant, he had his arms crossed with his eyes closed. Ambrose slowly turned his head to give the Kaioshin a look.

"You're very demanding."

"I'm a God." Zamasu poshly gestured to himself. "I expect the best of everything."

"But you said that humans aren't the best." Ambrose smiled. "This food I'm making shouldn't be close to decent in your terms."

"That's not the point." Zamasu raised a quick finger, accidentally smiling when he saw Ambrose's face. He wiped it off his face as quickly as it came. "Don't use my words against me, human."

"Fine, fine." Ambrose chuckled. The engineer went back to tending to his treat for a few minutes while Zamasu's eyes wandered around the decor and placement of things in this home. It wasn't long until Ambrose left the soup to cook and came to sit on the other edge of the couch, consciously considering the space between the two. "That will be ready in fifteen minutes."

"That's good enough for me." Zamasu shrugged. Ambrose folded his hands together, propping his arms over the headrest of the couch and tilting his head to show interest.

"So…" Golden eyes looked into grey irises, "What did you come to discuss tonight?"

"So…" James crossed his arms, "Someone's really stalking me?"

It took quite a while for Adrian to get through with this. It was very late at night on a chill day in East City. Adrian's home was mostly quiet, minus the two guys cracking open cold ones with one another, and to be fair they weren't cold ones, it was just sparkly fruit juice. The Kiran Incident (it's actually dubbed that by Mace) happened over a week ago, James already had this knowledge back when he was called by Bee. Now, he and Adrian were chilling in Adrian's kitchen. "You know this already. You were called like what, a few days ago?"

"Yeah but…" he shook his head. "You know what, no, I think I can get behind this…"

"You better get behind it." The music producer shook his head.

"Adrian," James placed his hand on his friend's shoulder. "Don't worry so much about me, man. Trust me, do you know how much security I have around me at almost all times? They can't crack even a scratch on me."

That was true; they were both famous people, they need to have security with them for reason like this, albeit this mess was rather rambunctious at best. "You're right, you're right…"

"Don't forget that I know how to fight, dunce." James booped Adrian's head.

Adrian sneered. "You're talking to me about knowing how to fight."

"Okay, maybe not as great as you do, but I can fight, dammit." James raised his arm and flexed. "These muscles aren't just bags of tackle-air."

"Uh-huh, but regardless I kind of can't help it." Adrian scratched the back in the head. "I'm just-"

"Soft."

"No…" Adrian shook his head adamantly. "I'm not soft."

James took a step forward, and flicked his wrist twice with his index finger out, and he pointed to Adrian's chest. "Soft."

"Man, shush." Adrian laughed minutely, he can't deny what James said to be fair. "Great way to lighten my mood, Baskets."

"No problem, my fren'." James gave Adrian a playful smirk. "Nothing's gonna happen to m-"

The two men heard a noise in the living room, the same nearly inaudible sound transmission normally makes, making them pause and go to investigate what that was. The both of them were very surprised to see that this very intrusion was made by none other than-

"Zamasu!"

"Uhh… Welcome in?" Adrian supplemented James' exclamation with that question, making the Kaioshin narrow his eyes at him with a smirk.

"Quite a nice sight to see James here." Zamasu looked at the basketball player. He didn't need to apologize for teleporting into their house because Adrian and he are amicable.

"Where were you?" Adrian asked Zamasu. "Aren't you supposed to be preparing for that trip we're all going to?"

The winter resort vacation thing was actually something Zamasu was looking forward to, he no longer minded the idea of traveling with these people as long as the boys, or Lexi were joining in. Not only that, there is still much that he has yet to see in this vast planet. They were supposed to leave in about five days from now, and go to the cozy, cold vacation city Intima located in northern Efilia for three weeks.

"You're supposed to prepare for a vacation?" The Kaioshin frowned. "Isn't that counterintuitive?"

"Not when you have clothes to pack." Adrian said. "Irene is going to be busy for the next few days beforehand, so she gets stuff all prepared several days prior to the resort. Figured you were doing the same as well."

"I wasn't." Zamasu said. "I was out most of the night today."

James raised a brow. "So you were hanging around before coming here."

"I was at Ambrose's house."

That garnered two very shocked faces from both the men. "What were you doing at a friggin' trillionaire's house!?" Adrian exclaimed.

"Talking with him." That was literally all it was, and Zamasu got carried away with the time thinking that he'd spent less than an hour in Ambrose's company but instead, it turned into three; three whole hours with a humanoid mortal. Give this man a medal for being able to hold Zamasu's attention for so long.

"Well," Adrian chuckled, "You're over here making friends with stupidly rich people."

"We're both rich, dude." James tapped Adrian's upper bicep.

"Right, right." Adrian nodded. "Is that all you wanted to do, come here to say hi?"

"Pretty much." Zamasu shrugged, he really had nothing special to say. "I also don't want to go back to that woman's house again."

"Irene?" James snorted. "Bro, go back there and eat all of her food again."

"Umm, no." Zamasu crossed his arms and leaned forward. "I don't do that."

Adrian cleared his throat, and then made a mock-phone gesture with his hands before he imitated Zamasu's voice. "'You can't finish that all by yourself.'"

Did this woman seriously tell everyone that? Ugh. "Shut up."

"My bad," Adrian waved at him, "So what, you wanna spend the rest of the night with us?"

"Why not?" Zamasu shrugged again. "Where's Jay?"

"He went to pick up Lexi from Rose Corp." Adrian smiled. "She's been working pretty hard and well with Ambrose. Heard he's a really nice guy."

"Bro, she can't stop talking about him." James started to laugh. "She's already got mad stories to tell and it's only been what, like a month since she's started collaborating with him. He's got charm."

"To be fair, she's kind of a fangirl for dude, even to this day soooo… Jay better watch out." Adrian shrugged, Zamasu looked between the two with a smirk on his face. He may have more in common with Lexi than he thought…

"Will he be back shortly?"

"I'm sure he's driving to the North to drop her off home and then coming back here. Either that, or he's gonna go see Mace."

Hmm… This night was interesting, it would be even more so if the four of them could sit together and talk for a bit. They had a week to get ready for said winter resort, and Irene had packed all of the stuff that she would need in advance since Rebecca had offered to get an express luggage carrier (this basically transports the heavier portion of your luggage separately, normally a few business days before the destined trip) for everyone; all eight of them were required to pack their winter stuff early. Zamasu didn't have anything in particular because the winter cold could never bite his Godly skin, and he wasn't savvy in what they do in resorts like this.

What was supposed to be an hour or so of talking once again turned into more than that, it was around 2 AM in the morning when Zamasu and the men had departed because they had to sleep, he left East City and flew around while looking down and around the terrain before landing in an opening near a lake was present. It was mostly quiet aside from crickets here and there, and the sound of footsteps and rustling buses.

Zamasu turned to see someone emerged from the bushes with an old bucket of water in her hand. She had a tiny plumeria pinned on the crown of her head and her gownlike shirt was baggy but dirtied for the most part. She had a tiny smile on her pudgy cheeks but stopped in her tracks when she saw the green man in regal garb raising a brow at her.

"Hello."

She kindly waved at the man, Zamasu found it weird how she didn't bat an eye at his appearance in the same fashion that neither Naz, Nousha, Shona or Ambrose did. "Hello there." He fully turned his body towards the girl, she put the bucket of water down on the ground and held her hands behind her back with a tilted head, as if she was waiting for him to say more. "Why are you out here in the middle of the night?"

The little girl smiled. "I live around here." She looked down at the bucket of water. "I just went to get some water from the lake nearby."

Zamasu didn't know there was a village of some sort in the outskirts of Tycho's major cities, he didn't even spot a village. "Huh… Where do you live? Do your parents know that you're doing this?"

"No."

Zamasu frowned. "You'll worry them over your absence."

"My parents don't live with me."

That made the frown on his face grow deeper. "They don't?" A shake of her head. "Then where are you living?"

She leaned to her right, and then pointed with her tiny finger at the place behind him. Ahead of this opening was another one, covered by a couple layers of trees. He can see a small abandoned wooden cabin that had support beams on the bottom. These support beams had stairs that would lead the person up to the front door of the aged house, and from what he could tell there was actual lighting in the place. Zamasu widened his eyes, and the little girl picked up her bucket again.

"It's very big and roomy, but I like it." He watched as she walked a little bit past him before turning around. "Do you want to come too?"

Zamasu… seriously never seen such adorable eyes on a human before. Her eyes were big, bright and vibrant, despite how weary and old her clothes looked. They were a beautiful tricolor mix of hazel and a blueish silver that was brought out by her curled eyelashes. Her tiny little face was so pudgy, it reminded him of Ollie.

"Sure." He was intrigued how this little girl was so independent at such a young age, being able to travel around an aimless forest for resources. As they got closer, Zamasu saw the tiny nine-by-nine garden she had on the side of her house and it was slanted due to the hilly feature of this particular part of the forest. There was a pipe like contraption that was a few feet above a little platform with holes in it on the very top edge of the tiny garden, such a thing look weird and at first he raised a brow until he realized that this was a simple form of irrigation.

This young girl was using the slanted terrain as an easier means to let water travel down to her plants.

Alma placed the water bucket down and used her tiny hand to open her door by pulling the locket to the right and then pushing the door open. For some reason, seeing that little action done by a child looked cute to him, he entered and looked into the humble abode; there was mostly nothing and she was right, this place was roomy for her. The lights were makeshift candle lanterns that were on the tiny shelves around the wall. Some other portions of her clothing were hanging on a rack or folded on the shelf above the rack, and there was a wood-metal table on the far left of the place, right in front of the window. Her bedding was an old blanket and a sheet, there was a small kindle with metal burners for any pot or kettle she needed to heat up, and indeed there was a pot already on the burner. She poured the water from the bucket into the pot and then angled this weird upside down funnel-to-straw contraption over the top of it, and then placed another couple of open jars at the long straw's other end.

This girl knew what she was doing. "What is that?"

"This?" She pointed to the contraption. "It's a distiller. Removes all the possible gunk in the water, and makes the water clean."

Zamasu blinked, impressed. "That's remarkable."

She smiled. "Yup. My uncle and grandpa taught me this, I still use it to this today."

She's smart. "So why is that pipe so long?" Zamasu knew why, he just wanted to see if she knew.

"The water has to be cooled, but I don't have anything to cool it so I have to use a longer straw so that the water can cool from the room temperature." Her response was well thought out, Zamasu was starting to like this girl.

"How old are you? And what's your name?"

"Oh!" She instantly lit up, Zamasu found her to be super adorable now. "My name is Alma, I'm seven."

"Seven?" The Kaioshin's eyes went wide. "And you know all of this at such a young age?" Alma nodded, and Zamasu shook his head. Again, he was thoroughly impressed. "What… happened to your parents?"

He hoped that they weren't dead, at least. "Well… my mom is probably in Efilia still, she was having a rough time and didn't want me around." Alma looked elsewhere for a moment. "And I haven't seen my dad in three years."

"How come?" Zamasu leaned forward, he was now sitting on the chair in front of her only table.

"Mommy and daddy got into a big argument, and she banned him from seeing me again." Alma pursed her lips and nodded. "But my uncle tells me about the stories and things my dad would say to me."

Zamasu shook his head. "So you've been separated completely from both of them." A nod. "And you're still living here, all alone, for three years?"

"It's only been one and a half, but…" Alma looked around her little home. "I like it, really. I don't mind being around the trees and stuff, but these trees aren't big. The ones at my uncle's house are huge."

Zamasu smiled. "I like your spirit, truly… it's truly special." He looked down in thought, the sound of the boiling water filling the room until Alma's little feet creaked against the floor from her footsteps. It may or may not be intentional, but Alma picked the best spot in Tycho to live in. This particular area of Tycho never hits below rain weather, it is mostly tropical all year round here, so she didn't need to bundle up too much or stock up on food.

"Do you have a place you live in?"

Alma was curious to know why Zamasu was in the middle of the forest. He looked at her. "I do, I live in a sacred realm that's a part of this universe." He said.

"So you're just visiting?"

"For the sake of a 'lesson'." He leaned back in his seat. "My mentor wants me to spend a year with the humans and mortals of this planet."

"Oh." She nodded slowly. "How is it?"

"It's…" He had to take a moment to fully formulate his opinion because Zamasu didn't realize he had a lot to say about the past four months. "It's interesting."

"That's good." Alma smiled. "Why are you spending a year here?"

"So that I won't hate mortals anymore." Zamasu straight faced.

"Do you hate them now?"

That was a surprisingly hard question for the Kaioshin. He didn't even know his stance anymore, despite him stating that he does but… being around little Alma, it suddenly doesn't feel like that anymore. "I guess."

"How can you guess that? Uhh…" She tapped her finger against her chin. "I don't know your name."

He regarded her. "It's Zamasu."

"Oh." Alma nodded. "But… hate is a strong word, Zamasu." It is, indeed, and Zamasu would have used it to describe the way he felt before. "Maybe you just don't like what they do. You don't look like the kind of person to hate people."

Oh dear, Alma's so cute. Lowkey, Zamasu wouldn't have a problem keeping this little girl with him, she has a bright mind. "I don't?"

"You look like a really kind guy."

The Kaioshin never regarded himself as a kind person, despite using that as a trope because of his Godly status amongst these mortals. He never used that word to describe himself, really. "Really?" That earned and 'mmm-hmm' and a tiny nod from Alma. He chuckled a bit. "Why, thank you."

"You're welcome." She looked back to check on the pot and the two jars, the first one in line had a bit of clean water already dropping into it. Alma went to sit beside Zamasu, hopping onto her table. "Are you living alone?"

"I'm with some woman."

"Really?" Alma's eyes lit up. "Who is she?"

"She's an artist." Zamasu said. "Her name is Irene."

"That sounds familiar…" Alma tilted her head. "My dad has a lot of these pictures made by a woman named Irene. Is she really cute looking with big, puffy hair?"

Zamasu cocked his head to the side with a slight shake. "I wouldn't know about cute, but yes, she does have hair like that."

"What do you mean?" Her face was bright as she smiled. "She's very cute! She looks like a sweet person."

"You have no idea, Alma." Zamasu shook her head. "She's not a sweet being, at all."

Alma frowned. "Are you saying that because you don't like humans?"

How the hell did she tie those two knots together so quickly, instead of taking what he said at face value? "That's not the case." Zamasu shook his head, and Alma narrowed her eyes calculatively. "I'm serious!"

"Are you sure?"

Zamasu had the strange urge to pinch her cheeks. "I'm positive." He crossed his arms, adamant in his own parables.

"Well okay." She ceased her stare. "It's really late, maybe you should go back to her home so that she doesn't worry about you."

Zamasu could almost laugh at that. "She's probably asleep, and I have been outside of her home very often. She's used to it."

Alma nodded. "Don't you get tired?"

"I don't need to sleep as much as your species does." Zamasu said. "If I wanted to, I'd do it just for recreational purposes. It's very rare for my body to be exhausted to that extent."

"Wow." Her eyes went wide. "That's not the same for me because…" She started to yawn. "...I have to sleep a lot since I'm tiny."

"I was about to scold you for being up so late the first time I saw you." Zamasu joked. "You should be in bed, little one."

Alma nodded tiredly. "I know, I know…" She grabbed a little fan from her desk and went to the boiling pot. She waved it several times at the fire to put it out. "I'll rekindle this tomorrow."

Zamasu watched as she did this little action, he found modesty in her lifestyle. Before she would lay down on her little bedding, Zamasu raised a hand and it started to glow while she was facing away from him. The second this glowing happened, Alma turned around and saw a full jar of water in his palm being conjured. She blinked like six times, before furrowing her brows at the Kaioshin.

"I happen to be part of a species of Creators." He smiled. "This is for you."

Alma turned completely with a budding smile on her face. "You didn't have to do that…"

"But I wanted to." Zamasu stood up and placed the full jar next to her two almost empty ones. "That bedding doesn't look very comfortable."

"It's manageable." Alma said, about to say more when Zamasu held his palm downwards and conjured up a softer, fluffier bedding that she could sleep comfortably in. Again, the little girl could only stare in shock at the small acts of kindness that Zamasu was giving her. Her big silver-hazel eyes went back to Zamasu and that budding smile began to bloom.

"That's really kind of you, Zamasu." She clutched her hands together. "Thank you. Can I get a hug?" Zamasu approached her and held out his arms for a hug while standing. Alma shook her head. "No no, come down; I want to hug you!" She outstretched her tiny arms and made squeezing motions with her little hands. Zamasu couldn't help the smile on his face, she was beyond endearing. He accepted her request, kneeling down to allow Alma to give him a hug and…

It felt warm, really warm and heartfelt. You ever hug someone and you can feel the comfort and humility in their embrace? That is what Alma had, even though she was tiny the warmth of her hug could felt all over Zamasu's body. He was almost reluctant to let go.

"Thank you." She had to say it again, her little voice sounded smooshed because her cheek was against his. He didn't think humans had such a… homely vibe. They released one another, and Alma looked at him with these giant bright eyes, it made Zamasu pause a little before he finally reached up to pinch her cheek lightly. He couldn't help it.

"You're welcome." He returned the gratitude, and motioned her to lay in her new bed so that she could sleep. She sat and then laid down, pulling her new covers over her tiny body and giving him a wave with a toothy grin.

"Good night!"

Oh by the Gods, can he take this little girl? Can she just be his daughter for like, ever?

"Goodnight." He smiled down at her before looking away, and exiting her tiny house. He descended down the stairs and took one last look at the cabin before teleporting out of the opening of the forest.

 **0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0**

Ethan didn't live that far from Rose Corporation by car, it was a 45 minute drive from where he lived, which was West City, down to the middle of the South. So the first thing he did after work was drive home, open his door, and collapse right onto his sofa. He had never had to do so much mental gymnastics in his life, and this was only from answering phone calls and looking at his desktop computer's screen, and glancing at Lexi Rayne, the model that was working with his boss currently. This went on for two whole weeks of him being extensively clumsy as usual, and more and more of a mess outside of his workplace.

You should see his living room right now, it looked like entropy heaven at this point.

He took off all of his work clothes, clad in nothing but a pair of boxers and socks and decided to check his bank account, knowing that he wouldn't have enough money because his girlfriend keeps using all of it without his permission. It's a habit he does, as if money is just gonna fall from some red tinted tree or some shit. Optimism sucks, it sucks in his case.

Ethan pulled out his laptop which wasn't charged all the way, he always charges it before leaving the house but his girlfriend probably used it again. He went to his bank account, entering his PIN and whatnot, and was greeted with the balance in his accou-

The man legit almost fell off of his couch, matter of fact he did roll off the couch at the fucking number in front of him: Z2,498.4.

That was the amount of money he made from working at Rose Corp for only two weeks. He didn't even realize today was payday either, and prior to this job he only had 600 Zent sitting in his bank account which was gone within the past several hours. This one payroll was enough to pay his rent more than four times over, and the last job he had only gave him a good nine hundred bi-weekly which wasn't bad, but it is when you're living with someone else who doesn't work.

But then again, this is Rose Corp we're talking about; even a basic job there gets you above the average income percentile which is… a pretty high percentile for our living standards, to be honest.

He got up from the floor like an idiot, and placed his laptop back on his coffee table. The man had to rub his eyes again; nearly 3 stacks of Zent, god damn… and to think this whole week would've been mundane.

Well, it hasn't been, mainly because his workplace was the only enlightening thing about his life right now. He was always learning something new at Rose Corp, you would think that a large corporation of that caliber would subject their workers to strictly sitting in cubicles and nothing more, but that was not the case at all; he's seen many employees just chilling in the food courts, leaning at their door frames exchanging ideas with one another, taking a breather outside, everything was so chilled down about the place, he wondered how the hell it manages to be this affluent without strict labor.

That's Ambrose for ya, somehow the man is able to manage and distribute money better than our FRS. How sweet. It's truly a god's blessing to be a part of this faction of work.

And speaking of God, Ethan went to open his living room curtains and he caught a glimpse of someone flying through the sky. At first, he jumped back thinking that he must've gone crazy for real, but went back to see that it was… the same green guy that flew him, literally, to his workplace. The man stopped in midair and looked around the area before looking directly at Ethan who was staring at him. How the hell did he spot me that quickly?

Zamasu was frowning down at Ethan, because… the man was almost naked in front of his window gawking at the Kaioshin. Ethan had realized that once he looked down at himself and quickly hopped backwards away from the window, only to fall on his shoes.

I told you this man was a mess. Give him a break.

In bright daylight, Zamasu descended down to the window that Ethan was just looking out of, and saw this dude toppled over on the ground already. "How did you fall?" Zamasu was asking that to himself, and as Ethan stumbled to get back up, he grabbed the nearest pair of sweatpants (yes, this man has clothing laid out every damn where) and shoved them right on. In the middle of hopping on one leg, he turned to see Zamasu giving him a what the fuck look. All Ethan could do was wave awkwardly.

And Zamasu thought he was awkward as fuck. The Kaioshin teleported right into the man's living room, automatically scrutinizing the state of the premise with all of the clothes on the ground. Ethan was still staring at the window, thinking that Zamasu had vanished into thin air on some magick shit. "I'm right here."

He didn't even get the second word out and Ethan jumped so high that he fell back against his own couch. Zamasu glanced at him with a huge amount of concern, while Ethan chuckled nervously. "Heyyyy, nice to see you again."

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. I'm uhh… I'm good, I just had a rough week." Or two. "Don't mind all the mess."

"I'll try not to." Zamasu crossed his arms. "Is this due to your job?"

Ethan was surprised that this guy remembered why he needed to be transported to the airport. "No, it's just… it's just life."

That… was surprisingly relatable.

"Hmm." Zamasu looked around. "You did say it was Rose Corp, correct?" Ethan nodded. "I've read on behalf of that enterprise. Ambrose is your boss, is he not?"

"Yes…" Ethan furrowed a brow. "Do you know him?"

Zamasu nodded, and Ethan widened his eyes. "So you've met my boss before?!"

"I'll assume before you did, yes. I didn't know I'd catch the sight of you again." Zamasu tilted his head and Ethan blinked twice.

"Am I in trouble or something?" He asked. "Why are you here?"

"I'm bored."

Ethan paused, and looked Zamasu dead in the eye before caving in. "...Same." Who would've thought this conversation would go by so swimmingly? The two bored men were interrupted by a phone call from Ethan's phone. The man went to go and pick it up, seeing that it was Chandler on the other end. "Chandler?"

"Ethan." The yellow AI sounded quite positive over the phone, Ethan smiled. "How are you doing?"

"I'm doing fine." Ethan glanced at Zamasu who happened to have a look on his face. "Why ask?"

"Just checking." Chandler swiveled in his office chair, propping his legs against the desk. "You left your whole briefcase here."

"...Ohhh…" Ethan looked downcast, he knew he was missing something. He looked at Zamasu. "I left my briefcase at work."

"How did you leave your briefcase at work?" Zamasu wasn't a forgetful person, he assumed that Ethan's briefcase was an important asset, and it is very hard to forget important assets.

"...Is that Zamasu on the other end?"

The Kaioshin glanced at the phone. "Yes, it is. Hello, Chandler."

While Ethan had placed the phone on speaker now and was standing here trying to figure how their encounter even happened, there was a pause over the phone before Chandler spoke again. "Do you just know everybody?"

"I ought to." Zamasu narrowed his eyes at the phone itself, as if Chandler was right in front of him.

"I didn't know you guys were friends." Chandler cocked his neck back.

"Umm…" Ethan looked from Zamasu to the phone. "He helped me by flying, and that was it."

"Huh." Chandler smirked, already knowing that they weren't friends to the slightest degree. "Zamasu, do you have a thing for flying into people's houses?"

"Not really." The Kaioshin smirked. "I just recognized him."

A chuckle was heard over the phone. "Well then, I'm coming over to return your case to ya Ethan."

"Oh, oh thank you." Ethan let out a breath of relief, he kind of didn't want to drive anymore today. "Thank you so much."

"You don't need to do that, Chandler." Zamasu took a step forward. "Where are you right now?"

"What?" Ethan frowned at Zamasu, who held a finger up in gesture for him to wait.

"I'm in Rose Corp…" Chandler said. "Are you gonna fly in here too?"

"Yes." the Kaioshin turned around, and then looked back at Ethan. "I'll get your briefcase."

"B-but why?" Ethan's more-than-slow brain was not processing this fast enough, the confused look on his face was almost comical.

Zamasu repeated himself before teleporting right out of his house. "I'm bored." He exited and looked around the area of West City, flying to his left and over to the South. From the pictures he's seen on his phone, Rose Corp was a more than noticeable corporation from the sky. He quickly spotted it, the place was marvelous looking from this height and he could bet it looked even more so at ground level. He teleported right in front of the entrance and entered the main lobby where the receptionist was. Said receptionist had wide eyes looking at the green Kaioshin as he approached him.

"Where is Chandler's office?"

The receptionist blinked a few times before answering his question. "First Quadrant of elevators, over here," The receptionist pointed to the room of elevators, each having a number as the quadrant, "up to the 14th floor, and into the joint rooms."

Fourteen floors? Zamasu went to the elevator in the quadrant and pressed the button to open it. He then got in and realized… how does one use an elevator? He looked at the many numbers, going from 'BSE' to 18, and he pressed 14 like a genius. He thought that this would take almost up to a minute, but he found himself at the destination in much less than ten seconds. He got out and turned into the very professional looking hallway, seeing technicians, scientists and mathematicians alike moving about with paper and blueprints and such, some of which speaking with one another, some of them were on the phone. The joint rooms were pretty easy to spot, the room right in front of him looked empty, that said room was Ambrose's office. He entered the joint hall where he saw a man with shoulder length hair exiting out of his own office.

Avery took a moment to blink at the man before him, who also blinked at Avery as well. Zamasu raised a brow at the attractive man. "Do you need to see someone?"

Avery's Efilian accent sounded a lot like Naz's. "I'm looking for Chandler."

"You've found me." Chandler exited his office with the briefcase in hand.

Avery turned around. "Some business going on here?"

"Amicable business." Chandler smirked at Avery, who snorted as Chandler handed the briefcase to Zamasu. "Here you go, hero."

"You and your smart tongue." Zamasu shook his head at the AI, who gave him a grin. "Thank you."

"Is this guy a friend of yours?" Avery pointed at Zamasu, Chandler looked at the fashion admin.

"I guess so?" Chandler shrugged, looking at Zamasu. "It's association, that's all." Avery nodded and shrugged before giving a nonchalant 'alright' and going back to his own work.

Zamasu felt the need to ask this. "Is Ambrose here?"

"He's not in today. He has other business to handle." Chandler said.

"Then how are you all working?"

"Ambrose is a busy body." Chandler tapped his hands against his office door frame. "If he's not in, then I'm managing what goes down around here."

Quite a nifty strategy on Ambrose's part, a human that wasn't at his caliber would not be able to handle such a giant responsibility. "I see, I see." He looked down at the briefcase and then back at Chandler. "We can talk more in the future."

"We can." Chandler shrugged. "I'll see you around, hopefully not in Ambrose's patio."

"Shush it." Zamasu smirked at him, and Chandler threw a side-smirk at him back. He gave a farewell to the AI and Avery as he passed by, teleporting back into Ethan's home. Now he had another location that he can transmission himself into. "Here."

Ethan took his briefcase and looked back at Zamasu. "Thanks, man, uhh…"

"Zamasu."

"Zamasu." Ethan snapped his fingers. "Right…" He didn't know to close this conversation, but Zamasu did it for him.

"I'll take my leave now. I'm not bored anymore." Zamasu turned around while waving goodbye at Ethan, who waved back before he teleported out of his house. Ethan looked down at his case, then at his phone, and then at the laptop on his coffee table before opening the Notepad program.

For some reason, he didn't feel bored anymore either…

 **※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※÷※**

A day, less than one day until they had to leave for Intima. Zamasu spent the past week learning about random stuff, going to different places, popping into Adrian's, Rebecca's, Ashley's and even Lexi's houses to talk with them, and reading about random facts just to pass the days by.

Did you know that the average speed of the humanoids in this planet is 45-50 miles per hour, or that the average IQ of a Tychian was 125? South City has the highest average IQ in the world being at 135, while the lowest average is in an island by Caplax which was at 107. Zamasu would've never guessed that, nor did he know that Draco used to be the most heavily populated country in the entire globe. That one fact was depressing, because as far as he knew, nobody lived in Draco right now.

As far as he knew.

He also fell asleep in a guest room in Ashley's house, and she woke him up by hitting him with a pillow multiple times. If you're wondering why; one night Zamasu went to her house and sat there talking with her and watching her type at like 500 words per minute, and then he got lazy and decided to sleep in her house even though he didn't need to. He recently checked up on both his canine children and learned that Ollie got a new harness and Loki got a new collar, both resembling Zamasu's skin color, according to Rebecca, they really like the color green now.

Now, he's sitting in Irene's living room reading a book, drowning the sound of Irene chatting on the phone with her friend. She had gotten off to tell him about how they were going to leave tomorrow morning so that they can get to Intima whilst the sun being up there. Tycho is just six hours ahead of Intima, and the women wanted to get there before it would hit 8PM in that city. It was 5:45 PM in his zone of East City, they would have to leave at 6AM tomorrow morning to get there by 7:15, and that would allot enough time for them because the sun doesn't set until 11 over there.

Tomorrow morning came by quick as hell; Irene fell asleep early while Zamasu stayed up and allotted that time to doing what he does best. There was no need for them to bag any suitcases or anything since they were taken via express, so all they had to do was dress up and leave for the East City airport this time through a private express bus. All eight of them; Ashley, Adrian, Zamasu, Jay, Lexi, Irene, James, and Rebecca were on this bus together, the women talked amongst each other while the men became a subgroup on their own without even trying to do so. They entered the airport just in time to go straight to their own destined plane.

This was the second time Zamasu rode a plane, arguably this one was not as luxurious as the one he was in with the guys but it serves its purpose, he sat down and either stared out the window at the oceans and landforms or talked to Jay who was sitting beside him.

He and Jay went into a conversation about the crimes and investigations being done since Jay's close cousin was being heavily involved in all these cases. He learned through this that the justice system in this country, Tycho, was insanely excellent at doing its job, the only thing that's making such a statement iffy was the amount of crimes going on simultaneously. It is brought to their attention that everything from the hackings down to the primitive black vans were all a part of some large scale scheme, something that Rogue, Bee, Mace and several other superintendents from different portions of the world deduced. This was no longer local; these events were happening at an almost global rate, so far Tycho and Caplax were the only ones getting sparks of organized crimes taking place.

Of course, this brought the attention of both Adrian and james, and while the women were talking about random, funny and short-ended things like their everyday lives, the guys were busy theorizing about what and why they were targeting James. Rebecca would glance every now and then at Zamasu's group as they spoke with one another.

They landed, and there already was a nice, large limo waiting for the eight of them. Zamasu entered, feeling a bit of deja vu except a little different, but it was just everyone talking and chilling and jokes galore. Within about thirty minutes they entered the large resort mansions that they would stay in; the bedrooms were healthily spaced out, there were a multitude of baths and the kitchens were large as well. The living room, notably, was well furnished and designed for a large group of people, but there was a second living room that was less roomy and more modest, meant for perhaps a couple of people to be in alone.

The first they all did before embarking on anything else was unpack their belongings, they got settled into their respective rooms (now Zamasu has a bigger room, and the bed is hella comfortable, dammit), and then Irene and Ashley offered to make everyone dinner. Now since Ashley is cool with Zamasu, he decided to eat this food because she was also cooking it, not because it was Irene aiding in such a thing.

Don't call him a hypocrite, he doesn't need to know that.

After the meal, Zamasu plopped down on his new bed, instantly embracing how soft and fluffy it felt against his back, and yes, the man was topless. He's been feeling… loose lately, and the second he entered his room he just threw off his gi and jumped on to his bed as if he had a long day of work. Jay came in to talk with him about martial arts, the different styles and adaptations, Zamasu asked him about how he gained his expertise on fighting. The producer proposed an idea that he and Adrian, and some of the others, were talking about; Lexi had spotted a large durable platform within a few miles of the resort, but it was still part of the large premise. It was around a hundred or two feet in both length and width, extended a few feet above the ground (there were stairs on each side), and had white poles on every corner that were twenty feet high. She says that sometime during the week, they all ought to invite a couple of people and have a sparring match, a free-for-all match. Zamasu can already tell that Shona was going to be included in the mix he couldn't wait to unleash his abilities on these guys.

That's if they can handle the grace of a God, which is highly unlikely. But Zamasu has yet to figure that one out, it won't take long for him to see that his title as an apprentice doesn't always uphold him as the end-game of power. In fact, he'll be surprised to see just what these guys can do at their peak performance…

 **‹›‹›‹›‹›‹›‹›‹›‹›‹›**

Shoes clinked against the floor from several different booted feet, all apart from one pair of heels that were clinking alongside them. Behind Andrea, were the six side-men managing the large liege they are building; Merkel, Evan, Duble, Shigeru, and George…

George Samos.

The man was freed by remediate bail about a week ago, he rejoiced with the main squad of this syndicate, and the many syndicates that worked with them, and he followed the third woman in command, Andrea, through this large unorthodox station that they had asked to be escorted to by the leader's finest spaceship. Said station was not even located in their home planet; there were a good fifty two megaparsecs from this solar system, Zyzen and their home planet, Desna.

The station was mostly a shiny silver color, some of the accents were a chromatic blue hue and some were pure white. The automatic sliding doors opened to reveal to the humanoid group a large, window-walled office with six bald and wide eared guards standing evenly on each side of the desk. The floating chair was turned around so they couldn't see the person sitting on it.

"I reckon you left a few beacons for the ring." Andrea referred to the global conglomerate of their group as a ring, despite their largest stations being in one country. "Our comparators are having a bit of trouble extracting them all, Jiruda."

Here was the leader of this solar system watching over his home planet, Hast, a homogenous planet comprised of double of Desna's population. Due to how advanced their civilization is, a large amount of their consensus lives in space city-states, if you took a ship around the solar system Hast resides in, you'd see a multitude of floating city structures all around, spanning millions of light years apart. This particular leader has been in this position for so long, Jiruda has seen several scenes of species cessation in his lifetime. At this point, considering how far ahead his people were, there was no need to worry about the 'needy' group behind him.

"Well." He finally spun around, his deep velvety voice was backed by the acousitcs of the room. He leaned back nonchalantly as he straightened his open collar, exposing his clavicles, "Perhaps that's a problem having to do with your comparators, is it not?"

It wasn't. Jiruda purposely calibrated those beacons to keep them from being easily detected.

"It isn't." Merkel spoke up, making Jiruda's hairless eyebrows raise. "We've strengthened the signals but our comparators are doing their job-"

"Not well enough, my friend." Orb black eyes closed with a slight shake of his head. Jiruda stood up and turned back to his walls, looking out into space. "I can lower down the intensity of them, just to keep your techwares from exploding and flying all over the place. That would be really messy." He made a swiping motion above his own wrist, enabling a holographic popup screen against his table. He pressed a single button, and then turned his head back to Merkel. "Done."

Andrea's receiver started to beep, getting notifications from different sectors who were getting the beacons in their area.

Jiruda crossed his arms, still maintaining his unimpressed, mock-bored timbre. "Is that all?"

"No. We bought someone else along." Shigeru stepped forward, gesturing the man beside him to come forth. "Remember Samos?"

"Ohhh, you're back!" Once George was fully in his sights, Jiruda raised his hands with a surprised smile, despite his voice being somewhat sardonic.

"I was here the whole time." Samos frowned. "How did you not see me?"

Jiruda blinked, his arms fell back he shrugged. "You're kinda short, man."

That made Samos silent, and Duble looked at the leader, green eyes into black. His sweet talker instincts kicked in as he flashed the old leader a charmy smile. "Are we, by any chance, getting an extra 'boost' in our efforts, EM. Jiruda?"

EM is short for eminent, a word Jiruda's people uses to describe a leader. Jiruda blinked over his disposition. "You all need to be patient if you want to take over your world."

"We've been told this many times over by you." Andrea placed her hands on her hips. "Why not allow our alliant efforts to seize the world as it is? The population is lower than it has ever been if we consider the advancement of the world."

"You do realize that such a thing took the last government several hundreds of years to exact." Jiruda shifted in his chair. "And that was only with the rest of the population being obvious cashcows." His harsh terminology was not to be excused, even though he shrugged it over. "It led to the most destructive war in your history, y'know. Everybody in that planet of yours is much smarter thanks to the aftermath of that same greed that's running your 'establishment', thanks of the ones who truly run your world…" Jiruda chuckled to himself, he did not mean any of the government officials when he said that either. "If you want absolution, you have to weed in your schemes one by one. You all are rich enough to do that anyway."

The humans collectively sighed and showed reactions to such a revelation, they all knew it would take time, but with absolution you can't wait too long or rush such a process, there is always a goldilocks zone with conquest of the masses. Despite the population being smaller, hence easier to control, the overall intelligence of the people renders them harder to conduct control over. It sure was a mighty paradox, all right.

"If that is all you want, then you can exit out of my office through whence you came." Jiruda plopped back on his seat, spun himself around (he has a habit of doing that) and looked out into space with his arms crossed. "I have a consensus to watch over."

Andrea pursed her lips as she motioned for her men to turn around and walk out of the office with her. Working with this man was difficult, not because he didn't do what she wanted, but because he would do so in his own way. Her boss' syndicate have nothing to fire against Jiruda; if he wanted to, he could evaporate Desna in seconds, and his semi-noncompliance can be soured with fact that they came to him, not the other way around.

Hell, why would he even attempt to voluntarily get wrapped into lower species' conflicts? Don't ask why he allowed them to go to him for help… just see it as a nice, more entertaining game of Sims for the eminent himself.

Jiruda turned his chair around to looked down at a holographic layout of a large sector of the Universe. It's signal ranged at least one tenth of the Universe's size, compressed into eleven inches right in front of his eyes, and he can zoom in and out of the holographic outline whenever he liked. His finger flicked to the left, then to the right, and he zoomed in on the large planet inhabited by the very humanoids Andrea's syndicate comprised of: Desna.

He leaned back and propped his booted feet against his chrome desk. They don't know, it's quite sad to see smaller guppies trying to nudge assistance from a callous shark. He chuckled to himself...

They simply just don't know.

 **l ‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l•l‾l**

 **Quick little note: Turmeric Carrot Soup is actually quite a detoxing dish; because of its thick texture it is attuned with the third chakra, within the vicinity of the abdomen, since digestion occurs at that chakra. Such a point is associated with self-esteem, expression and confidence.**

 **I did go back to fix up stuff because this story is actually picking up in originality, like I accidentally called this planet Earth when the name of it is Desna.**

 **YOOOOO OKAY, WE'RE GONNA HAVE A FUCKING SPARRING SESSION SOON WITH MULTIPLE PEOPLE FIGHTING AT ONCE, LES GOOO! This time, Zamasu will see if he'll have to hold back because of how strong he is, since he believes he's above all of them. Or is he?**

 **So, we are getting a bit more of an insight on the pioneers of this crime syndicate, as well as how big their alliance is. These guys span a larger platform thank you think.**

 **Jiruda's a heavyweight in conquests, he owns an entire solar system of races and greater than ever technology, so why is he involved with this syndicate you may ask? Pay close attention to how he speaks to them, Andrea and this scary, vile group mean nothing to Jiruda. His position of power renders him able to play cards on how they will stay or, how they can fall. This is a giant game, and to be honest, life is a game if you play it correctly.**

 **He basically just looks at their little scheme and how they treat it and goes y'all cute, lmao.**

 **Uploads may be stymied because of schoolwork lately, and work in general. There might be an upload every two to three weeks or so.**


	34. First Of The Week

**Now, this upload may have been well overdue but ey, 'tis here. School work is kind of a bottleneck right now, buuuut on the flip side it's getting closer to ending :). This is gon' be fun...**

 **There is a trigger warning here in this chapter. Rebecca's past events are brought up, they may be sensitive topics. Viewer discretion is advised.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **First of the Week**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

"Al _riiight_." Chandler clasped his hands together, pulling his cloud chair to sit down upon. He was in his own savvy house, having pulled up a large round table out of his floor and setting up six chairs for him, and the six other AI of varying colors: Kandrid, Genyne, Netryne, Amethyne, Rogue, and finally, Bee.

Kendrid's base color was mostly orange, his chassis was a very dark chromatic ash brown hue and he was built the same way Chandler was, adorning a humanoid chassis. Amethyne was mostly violet, but her chassis was accented with white and some shades of magenta; she had a female humanoid build with a very thin waist (she used to equip magnetic grenadiers on her waist area), and a defined feminine face. Netryne was all blue with baby blue pipes extending from her head down to her spine, her eyes were captivating cyan and she had faux cold blue hair, she as well had a mesomorphic humanoid build, and Genyne was the green AI who appeared the most human out of the four. She didn't have any kind of hair but had black sensable lashes with green undertones. Her eyes were a corrosive green hue that lit up kindly since out of the seven of them… she was the most lighthearted.

These were the longstanding individuals that Chandler knew before, during and after the Seven Years War, at the time each and every one of them were different types of government supercomputers for different governments. Chandler and Genyne were both Kiliken AI, and Bee was Himuran. Kandrid was from Caplax, Rogue from Efilia, and finally Amethyne and Netryne both hail from Draco. Tycho, or Kiliken, and Mandala, or Himura, were big rivals so the AIs were core-programmed to compete against each other. Now, more than seventy years later, the big indexes of man history were sitting amongst each other, they get along fairly well.

" _Constructor_!" Bee raised his tiny claws with a sarcastically excited voice while looking at Chandler, noting Chandler's constructor looking hat. Okay, maybe they _don't_ get along that well… sometimes. "Where's my seat?"

You may have also noticed that there is seven of them, so why are there only six chairs you may ask?

It's because Bee is small as heck, and Chandler is shady as fuck.

"Bee, you're shorter than my whole forearm. I didn't think you'd be able to see me while sitting down." Chandler replied with the calmest voice possible, making Bee shake his head and deadpan his lined-eyes.

Rogue looked at Bee, who was now reduced to plopping down on the table. "He's not _wrong_." Bee turned his head to look at the red AI.

"But he's not right."

"Then what is he, Indigo?" Amethyne frowned at Bee, dark violet curved brows arched at him.

" _Not right._ "

"Okay, okay," Kandrid raised both his hands, his cool voice coming in to simmer down the petty tension between the two, "I'm sure Chandler brought us here for something very important." He shot his yellow AI-friend a smirk, "Refrain from throwing insults at him for once."

Chandler closed his eyes, but regarded his friend with the same smirk. " _Right_. I called all of you here because I'm sure the seven of us have been up to date with what's going on around the world. So far nothing has affected the bigger areas of the global consensus, but I did want to know if any of you have caught anything quite… off about your surroundings."

Since they are all literally the OG supercomputers roaming the world now, they have a tendency to go back into their Hyperion mindsets, watching over and being connected with all the new governments of the world. "What do you think our occupation titles are, Yellow?"

Chandler shot a look at Rogue. "I am _aware_ of what you and Bee do. I'm speaking to everyone in regards of this."

"I have." Netryne leaned forward in her seat. Then she gestured to Amethyne. "Well, _we_ have. I have heard that multiple hideouts were mostly stationed in the most suburban city of Tycho, the East. But there was emergence of someone who was responsible for these crime batches."

"You did report that to me a day ago." Bee nodded. "That's taken cared for. But what about that 'leader' you were speaking of?"

"From what we gathered, he was once an engineer for a small-owned business, a high rankier actually." Amethyne added in. "He had disappeared for almost two years, he returned and continues working for Grimzy. But his involvement in the last crime scene was out in the open for us. His name is Regan Cornes."

"Regan Cornes…" Genyne frowned. Bee went silent in thought. "That man was the same individual who worked for Grimzy Studios, correct? They specialize in many of the smart combination locks." She turned to Rogue and Bee. "What evidence was found in regards to the last incident?"

"Ahhh, you know those locks that emit a current whenever the combination is incorrect?" Rogue raised a finger, knowing he could count on the six indices right in front of him. "That was found in the case that was recovered. Said case had a detonite EMP and we had to call this one to rescind it."

The _this one_ Rogue was referring to was Chandler. Chandler can nullify any bomb or EMP with a simple touch of his finger, which was better than having to solve the puzzle-like lock, and it only took Chandler several minutes to get to the site given that he can fly too.

"Regan Cornes?" Chandler looked at Amethyne. "Are you _sure_ that that's him?"

"That's what the records say." The other six AI received files from her index immediately, and they all went through the information in less than a picosecond. "It's rendered conclusive, and our indices are always up to date so…" The advantage of being supercomputers meant that they can literally track whatever they please. Though they do not spend their time syncing their index constantly, and they have the possibility of being wrong.

In this case, they weren't, but at same time they were. Regan _was_ involved in the sabotage, but he was not the leader. He was the fall guy; _Shigeru_ was the leader. To make things even shadier, said crime scene happened a little over a mile ahead of _Jay's_ house, and at this time Jay was in Intima. The ex-Tourney challenger made sure to keep his own name anonymous so that his expendables would go while he would continue to get stronger. Quite a nifty plan on his behalf, but the AI's did not know this and that's partly due to Regan's two year disappearance, otherwise they would have pinpointed that Regan was being put in the front lines.

They didn't need to know this right now.

"That's _strange,_ though." Bee looked downcast. "Cornes was never someone who'd stain his records like this." He was saying this because he knew Regan personally. As an acquaintance, Bee can say that he is _far_ from a delinquent.

"Though if he were a clean guy, it would make sense as to why he got sought after so quickly." Kandrid made a point to say that first timers, usually of a kind caliber, normally don't plan out something as meticulous as the sabotage Regan was in, and then end up getting away scot-free. Unless if you're a super-engineered genius psychopath, that is.

Bee shook his head. "I'm looking into him later." He pulled up a holographic screen and quickly sent out the notifications to the FPICA in regards to this info, which Genyne had transferred to his index in a picosecond. "He will be questioned."

"Other than that, nothing else has occurred within Tycho. Nothing immediate, of course." Amethyne said before quickly looking over to Rogue. "Do you still have that EMP as evidence?"

"It's still sitting in the codex files, yes." Rogue crossed his arms. He was about to ask why, but it suddenly clicked. "Are you going to pin the bomb's model?"

Pinning a model means to use the scan code of said said model to derive where it's from, what it consists of, and even how much it costs. Supercomputers have this insane ability; for all you PC nerds out there, this method's procedure is similar to mining cryptocurrency.

"Yup." Amethyne smiled. "If there are any electrically snappy bits, I can nullify them."

"You're gonna need my help." Chandler raised his hand, referencing the images Bee transferred to him. "EMP bombs, like the one they found, may have a dormant charge. I'll go with you."

"Can I come?" Kandrid raised a hand.

"Me too." Netryne shrugged her cold shoulders.

"Orange, Blue, why do you guys wanna join?" Rogue was already standing.

Kandrid and Netryne respectively glanced at each other become concurrently speaking. "I have nothing else to do."

Amethyne's purple eyes blinked for a moment before shrugging. "Fuck it, come along." That earned elated sounds from the two as they followed Bee, Rogue and Amethyne out of Chandler's savvy home. The doors slid and they exited, while Chandler turned to look at Genyne, and saying what she had in mind before she did.

"You want to go too, don't you?"

"Yup." Genyne chuckled, Chandler looked over the female AI as she smiled at him as she stood up. They walked side-by-side, exiting Chandler's house and meeting the five outside. Both their hands unintentionally brushed together in their gaits.

Bee looked at the two approaching… if he had a mouth, he would have the biggest _asshole grin_ feasible. "We're flying, y'all."

The seven of them moved farther away from the house to float a bit above the ground. They exchanged looks and transferred waypoints, before zooming out into sky and heading to the FPICA building without haste.

 **T_T_T_T_T_T_T**

Zamasu didn't think he'd spend nearly all of his first day here with Lexi at all. Last night, as he was sitting on his own bed, he thought he would be solitary once more and _then_ spend his time with the others but that didn't happen.

Lexi happened to _drag_ this green man along with her while shopping after he had lost a bet with her. They were both playing a game of Digits (like Numbers in our world), and if he lost he would have to join her while she went out shopping. At first, he protested because he thought that he would have to be around _all_ of the women for hours, but it was only her instead which make things better-

 _Worse._ It made things _worse_.

He should have protested against going regardless, because now they were both looking all around the lofty clothing shop and Lexi was wearing these chocolate brown curvy-fit jeans and a red silk robed sweater. It didn't help with the fact that she was right next to him…And that she's still pretty… and that her voice sounds beautiful at this proximity.

This guy is screwed for three weeks now, dammit.

"So do I have to just stand around here and watch you wallow in clothing?"

"Zamasu, I _barely_ even have like two outfits hanging on my part right now." Lexi gestured to her arm.

"How does _that_ equal two outfits?!" He looked down at her full arm, he practically couldn't even _see_ her arm with all the clothes she was holding. "There's at _least_ nine articles of clothing on your forearm right now."

Lexi gave him an obvious look. "That's not a lot."

"Yes it is!"

"No it's not!" Lexi looked at her pile.

"Why do have so many?"

"I might put some of them back, that's why."

The Kaioshin let out a really pained muffled groan that made his voice sound higher than usual.

Lexi gave him a look. "C'mon now, it's not that bad."

"Lexi," he held his hands up towards her while gesturing, "Do you _really_ think a God finds any enjoyment in _watching_ a human woman shop for clothes?"

Lexi blinked twice. "...Do you want me to buy you something, then?"

That earned an inhaled closing of the eyes, and an irked groan from the Kaioshin.

"Okay okay, how about this? I'll treat the both us to some food after this, are you feeling better now?"

There was a pause and Zamasu didn't look at her for a moment. And then he crossed his arms as if the offer wasn't good enough. "Don't ask me such a question."

Lexi smiled up at him and moved in real close tauntingly. He wished she didn't do that. "Is that a yes?"

"Do not question me."

"You're welcome."

Zamasu shot her a look, and Lexi smiled at him. _God_ , her smile was _beautiful_ , and she had the nerve to be all teasy with him when she looks so pretty. This isn't fair. "And when will that be?"

"Soon."

"You've said you'll be done an hour ago."

"Zamasuuuu, the more you complain, the more I won't be able to pick something out!" Lexi frowned at him. "You know what, you've been just following me around, why don't you help me find some stuff? I'm sure you can pick out clothing that would look really good on me," then she made circling emotion with her finger at him, "with that _God eye_ of yours."

"I _can_ , and-you know what, I may as well!" Zamasu went off to the far side of the large clothing store, scanning around the hangers with various articles of clothing. He became confused, he couldn't find even one thing that remotely fit Lexi's sexy, feminine style and was wandering all throughout the sections he was in and it took him five minutes to realize…

That he was walking around in the men's section instead of the women's, which explained why everything suddenly look so masculine and could answer his internal question of _why do all the female clothes look so masculine now?_

Lexi was still standing where she was just smirking at his dumbass. I swear on _everything_ , Zamasu is not stupid. I _swear_.

He crossed his arms and stubbornly went back to where she was and passed right by her as she giggled, being in the _right_ section this time. He saw this one sea green low cut maxi dress and would expose the legs from the hips down, it was long and flowing and silken in touch. He sifted through the sizes and picked one up and went directly to Lexi and held it in front of her face.

"Oh shit…" She blinked. "This… this actually isn't that bad." She took the dress, shifting her other arm full of clothes and felt the flowy fabric against her fingers. " _Wow_ , you picked out a good one on your first try!"

"Because I'm a God, silly _mortal_." He poked her cheek and internally questioned where the fuck he got the courage to even do that. "You look nice in green."

"Hmm… I'm sure Jay can agree too." Lexi smiled at the dress and placed it against her arm. She started walking out of the section she was in. "I think I should look for shoes now…" Zamasu groaned loudly again, and Lexi tapped his arm. "I'm joking! I wouldn't do _that_ to you, it takes me forever to find the right shoes."

He sighed. "Good. Are we done now?"

"Hmm…" Lexi turned to look at him and pretended to be in deep thought. _This woman thinks she can be quirky around me like this? Ugh_. "You know what, we'll end it here. I know you wanna eat something."

"Inde-I mean… just hurry up."

" _Okay!_ You can't rush perfection, y'know." Lexi crossed her arms at him, though Zamasu could agree because Lexi took a bit more time than usual to do her natural makeup and get her whole outfit ready and she looks… perfect.

 _Shut up._

Lexi had three reasons as to why she was going shopping for clothing; souvenirs and Jay. She thought it would be nice to buy something to spice up their weeks here in Intima, since this winter resort is also quite known for being a very, very romantic premise. And besides, some of the clothing here can't be found anywhere else in the world, why not take it with her for wearing one day?

Notice how there was no third reason? As much as she doesn't want to admit it, she was planning on getting better outfits when she returns to Tycho for her meetings with Ambrose. Sure, the engineer didn't care in particular for how she dressed as long as she was able to do what she does best in it. The model didn't think she was subconsciously trying to garner his attention in a different way, though. It will become obvious to her one day.

She bought _all fifteen_ articles of clothing, having three large bags in hand once they left the giant clothing store. Now Zamasu turned to her. "Where are we going to eat?"

"Ever had Zhanlou before?" Lexi asked him, and Zamasu shook his head. "It's a kind of Mandalan noodle soup that tastes _amazing_ , I know you'd like it."

"I reckon I would." He smirked, following the woman towards where this Zhanlou soup place.

"Don't steal my bowl though." Lexi shot a hand at him, referring to the one time he teleported into her hotel and stole her dang macarons.

"Are you still on my case over that?" Zamasu shook his head with a smile. "Lexi, I have more self-control than that. I won't steal your food. Don't give me that look."

She was glaring at him playfully. "I'll try not to." He chuckled, seeing that they were about to enter a large, Mandalan themed restaurant. He could smell the distinct aromas of different dishes all around him and it was making his stomach _curious_. They both found a spot, rather a booth right by the wooden weaved wall, and proceeded to order, of course Lexi made sure to choose the best type of Zhanlou soup for the God, and he waited very patiently for his dark ceramic bowl.

"Are you tapping your finger against the table? Is that you?" Lexi was looking at her phone, so all she heard was the sound of tapping.

"No." Zamasu lied.

"Be _patient_ , Zamasu. It's coming."

"I am being patient." He crossed his arms. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Tsh." Was all she said.

"Don't roll your eyes at a _God_ , Lexi." Zamasu scolded. "Just because you're of higher interest to me does not give you the right to throw sass my way."

"You think I'm interesting?" Lexi raised a brow.

Zamasu frowned. "...What would you make you think otherwise?"

"You don't like our species."

"...But like..." Zamasu stammered, before recovering and frowning at her. "Just take the compliment."

"So you _do_ like humans now?" Lexi narrowed her eyes.

"That's not the case." Zamasu crossed his arms.

"Zamasuuuu…"

"Don't say my name like that." He continued to avert his gaze from her, and Lexi's smile grew even larger.

"Okay, okay." She raised her hands, backing off of teasing him, and she looked to see two men carrying their food towards them. They greeted the both of them kindly, and placed their meals down on their table. Zamasu's nose caught the exotic scent of his noodles in front of him; they were in a light broth brown-reddish soup, and were a beautiful ivory white color. He could tell they were thick and soft, he used the metal connected prongs that they gave as eating utensils (similar to the Asian chopsticks, except they are always made of metal and are connected at the end). He took to gathering some of the noodles, watching how they emerged from their soupy pool and then he ate them. He chewed and chewed, while Lexi looked at him expectantly, and when he was finished he had paused only to look up at her with a serious facial expression.

"It is almost _treason_ to expose me to a dish like this so _late,_ Lexi."

She laughed. "Well, I didn't have any _other_ time to do so, Z." She spun the prongs in her soup. "Thank Jay for exposing me to this, he knows how to make this."

"I will make note of that later." Zamasu said. He continued eating and loving the dish in front of him, wondering how he was going to get Jay to cook for him now. Quite a thoughtful process, ain't it not?

"After this, I'm gonna go look for perfumes too."

"You're _kidding_ now, aren't you?" Zamasu scowled, though the expression died down after she cheesed at him. "You idiot."

Lexi didn't find any offense in that. She just giggled. "I am kidding, we're gonna go back to the motel after this, hun."

"Who?"

Lexi blinked. " _Oh_ , I just called you 'hun'. It's an endearment thing."

"Isn't that what romantic partners call each other?" Zamasu gave her a wary look, not because of her necessarily, but because of _him_. It makes sense in a way.

"No, you can call anyone that, Zamasu." She smiled. "You're very innocent."

He narrowed his eyes. "My mind's is not tainted with nuttier thoughts like you _mortals_ , Lexi."

" _Riiiiight_ , I caught you staring at my ass while I was walking, mister."

" _WHAT_?!" He was in the middle of eating when he said that too, so his voice was all muffled. He started shaking his head vigorously, not only that, but he _knew_ he was doing that act before, but he could have _sworn_ it was accidental. "I-I wasn't _trying_ to! I was in deep thought!"

"About what?"

"I don't know, _something_!" Zamasu looked away, suddenly abashed. "I wasn't doing that out of… Out of, I dunno..."

She laughed warmly now. Zamasu looked back at her, her voice was beautiful. "It's okaaaay, man. I'm not gonna castigate you for doing so, I'm sure you aren't the type to… you know… Are you blushing?"

" _No!"_ He looked away from her, the very thought of acting out based on someone else's body was a bit _much_ for him, especially because this is Lexi we're talking about, and she's downright _beautiful_.

"Zamasuuuu-"

"Don't _say_ my name like that!" He pointed at her. "You are souring my appetite with your face."

"Why?" She frowned. "Am I ugly?"

She knew _damn well_ she wasn't. "...No…"

"Am I too pretty for you to eat?" Lexi smirked, obviously she didn't mean that in a dirty way and luckily, Zamasu's innocent mind didn't accidentally take that the wrongest way possible.

"...Just shut up." He went right to enjoying his damn meal because Lexi was distracting him at this point. Lexi smiled at him before her phone vibrated. She looked down to see that she got a message from somebody.

 **HotGold:** I wouldn't be surprised. It's quite cold there.

This was in the middle of their conversation, Lexi gave him that nickname. You can _easily_ guess exactly who this person is.

 **Lexi:** I'm in a restaurant right now, it's warm as hell :)

 **HotGold:** Again?

She smiled down at the phone.

 **Lexi:** Shush, I get hungry easily.

 **HotGold:** Right…

 **Lexi:** I think you're kinda busy right now, should I leave you be?

Lexi already knew Ambrose was in his lab right now, doing his whole smart guy stuff. She wouldn't be surprised if she'd have to leave the conversation now, even though she didn't want to because talking with him is quite entertaining.

 **HotGold** : I am busy at the moment, if I could I would continue talking, but I'd be boring from then on. I will talk with you later mayhaps. :]

She smiled at her phone again.

 **Lexi:** Bye Byeeeee

"Who are you talking to?"

Lexi looked up at the Kaioshin, who had already finished his bowl of Zhanlou soup. He had furrowed his brows at her. "Oh… I'm just talking with a friend."

"Who?" Zamasu smirked. "You look quite happy talking with this person."

"It was just a friend." Lexi put her phone down.

"Who is he?"

"Are you reading my mind again?"

"Maybe." Zamasu smiled.

"If so, you'd know _who_ he is." Lexi crossed her arms.

"Ambrose." He looked down at the mention of that name. "You look reluctant."

"I didn't want him to leave." Lexi looked down. "He's fun to talk to."

"I second that." Lexi looked at Zamasu and he continued. "I've been to his home before."

"What the hell?!" Lexi leaned forward. "How?!"

Again, he used the same detailed explanation that he gave Chandler, Mace, Jay and Ambrose. "I flew there."

"Oh." Lexi reclined again, at least she didn't ask him if he had a ship. "Hmm… what did his mansion look like?" She had widened eyes and leaned forward again. "Was it huge? Did it stretch for miles on end? Were there hundreds of cars in his parking lot? Did he have a parking lot?"

Zamasu blinked like multiple time. "Lexi… can you recline, please?"

Lexi realized she was nearly standing over with the amount of questions she had about the rich man. She sat back down. "Sorry."

"It is fine." Zamasu nodded. "And to answer your questions; no he does not own a mansion, no he doesn't have a parking lot either. But he has a _large_ opening space that he owns."

"He doesn't have a mansion?" Lexi's pretty brown eyes were wide. She looked cute. "And he's a _trillionaire_?"

"I'm sure from you spending even two hours with him, you would see that he isn't someone who is materialistic." Zamasu said. "His home is nowhere near as big as Rebecca's, but is very technologically savvy since he did construe it himself."

In the time he had spent once speaking with Ambrose, the man had told him the difference between someone building and someone constructing something; they both genuinely mean the same thing, but the engineers and scientists associate the word _build_ with physically making something, and the word _construct_ with the conceptualizing side of making something. So in their eyes they mean two different things, and Zamasu could make sense of the terminology.

"Ohh, that is… quite expected, actually." Lexi looked downwards, and then gave Zamasu a look when she realized he was pensive. "What are you thinking about?"

"Hmm?"

"You look like you're in thought."

"I'm just thinking about the last time we spoke." Zamasu's gaze was inadvertently on the golden handle of his chair. "He had so much in that little head of his."

"Little?" Lexi laughed. "He's got a big brain, dude."

Zamasu chuckled and shook his head. "He does…" He also has a wide personality, he was warm and welcoming to everybody, and he's rich and intelligent with a pure mind…

Almost too good to be true…

"Maybe I could probably get him to visit us one day. In these motels, I mean."

"Visit?!" Zamasu exclaimed. "Has your association with him warranted that?" He knew sure as hell that everyone would probably have _elevated heart rates_ , even the mere mention of his name gets reactivity from the others, and they are also renown names as well.

"Over the past month, I've been working with him. Needless to say, we came friendly quick as hell." Lexi smiled. "So it wouldn't be much a hassle. Besides, I think he'd love to see all of us, and I know you'd love to see him too."

He accidentally got _really_ defensive when she said that last part, so he answered her quicker than he should. "Shush."

"What?"

Zamasu blinked. And then he looked down. "Don't mind that, I thought you were being snippy again."

Lexi smirked. "Not at all." She giggled, and Zamasu shot a look at her. He honestly did not know why he reacted that way when Lexi said that he'd love seeing Ambrose again, it's been how long now… eight days maybe? And yet he felt like it's been two months since he saw that pristine, clean and healthy glowing face. Why did he want to see him again? He didn't really know, and he didn't know the source of his sudden possessiveness, if he could call it that.

Unfortunately… it was going to become _much more apparent_ within the next three damn weeks.

 **+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+**

Someone was calling Lexi's phone, which was now situated on Jay's nightstand. She had left it there and went to her own room to sleep a little over an hour later, though Jay reckons she'll retrieve it tomorrow morning. The caller ID didn't have a showable name (there's an option in which you could leave your contacts' name anonymous when they call you rather than show their name), but the number was saved onto Lexi's phone which raised a brow from him. Jay swiped to the right, not even thinking twice about who he could have answered to. "Hi?"

"Good evening."

Lexi's phone dropped from Jay's hand.

All he heard was the sound of that sleek, velvety, _rich and wealthy_ voice on the other end from the man that Lexi was working with. _The_ pioneer of their generation, he _just_ heard his voice in the flesh.

Jay stumbled to pick the phone back up. "H-hello?"

It was Ambrose. He was talking with _Ambrose Sarashina_.

There was a pause on his end before the rich engineer spoke up again. "I'm calling for Ms. Rayne, is she there at the moment?"

 _Holy shitfuck,_ Jay was trying to recollect himself. "Umm, she is asleep at the moment." God _damn_ , was this a random, _rare_ incident. Sure he knew Lexi was working with him but he himself would never imagine _communicating_ with this man at all.

"Oh, alright." Ambrose shifted in his office chair. "May I ask who this is? I reckon you can relay my call over to her when she gets back."

"Well uh, I'm Jay." Jay held his hand to his chest as if this dude was in front of him. "I'm her boyfriend."

"Really?" Ambrose smiled, genuinely positive towards this information. "Your name seems familiar, but I might be mistaking you for someone else."

"I'm Jukichi Teshima, yes." Jay nodded, the biggest smile was on his face right now.

"Music producer, Jukichi Teshima?"

The way he says Jay's name sounded like _sex_ , _gosh dammit_. And without even trying to. "Yep, that's me."

"Ooh, that's interesting." Ambrose smiled down at his keyboard. "You're quite a talented producer. I like your music."

"T-Thank you." Why the hell did Jay stutter? He was lowkey shaking too.

"Yo." On the other end, Evan walked into Ambrose's office, holding a packet of newly forged blueprints for an upcoming project the agriculture section was taking on. "Here are the blueprints you requested."

Jay heard Ambrose speaking to someone else, namely Evan. The engineer said 'Thank you, I'll be there momentarily' before returning to Jay. "Tell Lexi to call me back when she returns."

"No problem." Jay nodded; Ambrose sounded really kind over the phone, he almost seems like a homely person _already_.

"Thank you." Ambrose said; Jay could hear his smile over the phone. "Have a good night."

"You too." The two had ended the call, and Jay realized something quite peculiar; it was _in the evening_ in Tycho as we speak. Right now, it is nighttime in Intima's time zone, which means that Ambrose knows that Lexi is currently out of country. Of course, common sense made it obvious that Lexi told Ambrose this since they were currently business partners, Ambrose was aware of that timezone differentiation. That's quite considerate.

 _He likes my music._ This is some revelling news right here, Jay felt all giddy and shit now.

It was 2 AM. Everyone so far was asleep right now, he and Zamasu are probably the only individuals up right now. The entire day, for Jay, was spent mostly in his motel room getting things ready and speaking with his cousin and Shona about the possibility of a sparring session at the resort. Flights have a tiring effect on Jay, he ends up not wanting to do shit for an entire day because it burns him out, but he was certain tomorrow will be less of a drag after he wakes up. No, he wasn't restless at the moment either; after that call, he felt like he had a spring in his step all of the sudden. He got up from his bed and placed Lexi's phone on his drawer, she'll come and get it once she wakes up.

Jay would be mistaken in saying that there were only two individuals awake right now, because Rebecca had just knocked on his door after standing there and debating on whether or not she should hold her tongue on behalf of this subject. He seems like the only person she can talk to without feeling weird about what she had to say, since he wasn't her friend nor her moral enemy.

Jay heard a soft knock on his door and went to answer it. Thinking it was Zamasu, the producer had this smirk on his face as he opened the door. When he saw who it really was, he frowned. "Oh… Hello. I thought you were asleep."

Rebecca shook her head timidly. "Well, nope I'm not." She chuckled nervously. "I couldn't, actually."

Jay leaned against his door with a slightly tilted head. "What is it?"

He didn't sound impatient or anything, his voice remained impartial. "I… I want to tell you something."

"What _is_ it?" He reiterated.

"It might take a bunch of time to explain because… it's a lot." Rebecca looked downwards. "Can I sit with you?"

She was dancing around telling him what it was, but it might be something detailed that can't be explained with one abstract, so he sighed and moved to let her in his quiet and clean room before he closed his door completely. She looked around and then sat down on his bed, fingering the cuffs of her oversized sweater sleeve. Jay watched _all_ of her movements, despite him moving several things in his room (because Feng Shui, that stuff is crucial to him) to make the atmosphere comfortable, Rebecca was still sitting all tense. He can tell that this was going to be a conversation that required him to look at her body language.

When has he _not_ done that with someone he doesn't trust? And why would Rebecca come to him to tell him something lengthy, of _all_ people?

He approached his bed but didn't sit down, he had his arms crossed with a neutral look to his expression. "You can start now. I'm listening."

Rebecca looked like she had a hard time even _formulating_ what she was going to say. Here she was speaking to someone she's kind of infatuated with, breaking out something that should be irrelevant, because no one cares about this subject... right? It's been _years_ since that _one_ event happened, nobody including her gives a shit about what happened back then, _right_?

"I…" She struggled. "You know, I've been a really choosy person back then and, and even now sometimes I am but li-" She stopped to sit up straight and gesture to herself. "I know that I shouldn't be bringing up past events to atone for what I did recently, but it's something that, that has and still… Affects me to this day. It sounds stupid to you, I know that, but I've been thinking about… coming clean for a while now."

"If it were stupid, then you shouldn't waste your time speaking about it." He raised an eyebrow. "Does this have something to do with somebody?"

"...more than one person, yes."

"And what timeframe is it then?" If this was drama, then the boredom present in Jay's face would be _evermore present_.

"Highschool."

That made him frown; _high school_? How old were they again, _in their mid to late 20s?_ Why bring up a matter from high school for fucks sake? "Umm… okay?"

Remember that spring he had in his step? It's gone now.

"I'm sure Adrian told you that we were once dating at the time, like during sophomore to junior year."

"He did." The look on his face grew sour. The Adrian he knew, according to James, was _very different_ from the Adrian back in highschool. Sure, Rebecca took the greatest advantage out of his kindness, and untruthfully projecting him as a cuckold boyfriend was one of them. He was way too sweet back then, and now he's a lot less so; when he would walk down the halls he'd have this bright look about him. Now, you'd _think_ that Adrian was a stoic person had you seen him strolling down the street. "He told me _a lot_ of what happened during that time."

She saw the accusative look he gave her, and rightfully so. "Well, there was something that took place after we broke up, and… I guess it was just karma because of the people I was around and how bad of a person I was." Rebecca looked away, closing her legs and sort of sitting in a shriveled, less confident way all of the sudden. "But umm… where do I fucking start here umm-"

"Take your time." Jay now had his hands against his hips.

"I don't wanna waste yours, so-"

"You look frustrated." He cut straight to the chase, already answering to her response. "The more you force yourself to think around the topic, the less coherent you're gonna sound."

"Well…" She looked down. "Nobody knows about this, not even Irene does. Umm… it was junior year, I was at a party with a bunch of friends, the same people who umm… helped me with hurting him." Rebecca said. This was information Jay already knew. "I was you know, doing the whole party thing; drinking and dancing and all that and umm…" This is where her voice started to waver. Not crack, but waver, and Jay raised a brow.

"I left the place where all my girls were and went with the guy who I was dating at the time, a week after dumping Adrian." A pit started to grow in her stomach. "And… we were making out, we were alone or so I believed, and… his friends came."

"Uh huh?" Jay was getting back on his bed to recline against the headrest. He frowned deeply before giving her a cautious look. "...Where are you going with this?"

Rebecca took a deep breath and went silent for a short moment. She couldn't look Jay in the eye, even though she felt _compelled_ to tell _him_ this. "I umm… they and I were left alone in this basement and the door was closed and… they forced me in." Rebecca sniffed very quickly, realizing that she was starting to cry again and she quickly wiped her tears in a shameful way.

Common sense told Jay that she was… raped that night, but Rebecca didn't want to utter such an act. "They did… something to you?"

"A lot of things, umm…" Now her voice was breaking; repressed memories of what took place that _very_ night started to resurface as she spoke, she shook her head slightly. "It was like six of them, they held me down and," she took a moment to wipe away her stubborn tears, _no_ she did not want to cry over this shit, "and I don't know how much time had passed, but I woke up the next day and I could barely walk…The door was locked so I had to get all my clothes on when I could and climb through the outer window."

He just looked at her, he had to nothing to say whatsoever. He couldn't say anything in this matter so he looked downcast while she continued, still crying and voice breaking in front of him.

"From then on, I kinda just lost everything and… started doing all kinds of bad things to pick up from all the shit that happened. Even in college, I was doing so well in my medical studies because I had nothing else and if there were anything else, it would be fucking other random guys." She stopped and sniffed, not wanting to divulge into that topic. "I've tried multiple times to change and I struggle with this problem. Like ever since then, I became more irrational and I had a hard time remembering even the smallest things and… and I still have stupid triggers over it. I can't fix that, even though I want to, and I _swear_ I am trying my best to redeem myself. It's just…" And then she started to laugh, but it wasn't out of any bit of humor. Every chuckle she made caused more tears to flow out, as in revelation of who she _really_ is. "God, I'm _fucked up._ "

Rebecca had to suck it up, she felt the need to hold back and repress how she was feeling because now that it was unearthed, it felt _stupid_ ; it felt irrelevant and unreasonable to tell this to him even though it's been years since the incident, and it only brought up the one thing that she had always hated to admit: it had _changed_ her. She can't do anything about the psychological effects this trauma had, she can't _help_ the memory loss, or the paranoia, or her sometimes fragmented thought process, she knows that but won't admit it. She can't change the effects of the past, even though she _really_ wants to, so now she was wiping away her tears and trying to keep from looking more and more stupid in front of someone who doesn't even like her. What kind of person does _that_? Why couldn't she just tell Irene or Lexi-

No, Rebecca can't bear the idea of two of her closest friends _knowing_ she was violated.

As for Jay, he already knew she was trying to look like it didn't actually affect her but was failing horribly. What she thought was stupid, was _nowhere_ near what was going through Jay's mind; yes, he never experienced that at _all_ , _ever_ , but… he knows that it's effects aren't just some simple thing you can _brush off_. Not having any control in a situation that involves your own confidence and being is horrible in itself, he's had a friend who went through this…

And he's lost the same person to it the next week.

No, not because she was murdered in the act. She called him over the phone and they were in separate countries over a winter break. She was _bawling_ , barely able to say a couple words before sniffling over the pain that wrecked her body. It happened on the _same night_ she called him, and she told him _everything._ The girl was already beaten down and broken by her own parents and after finding herself confined underneath someone else, she lost it. She lost it all, and ended her own life the next week.

It is an unfair idea of the victim to hold back no matter how long ago the trauma was, but it is a response they always have regardless. So while Rebecca was shaking her head and inwardly telling herself to stop it, it was _pointless_ , Jay leaned forward and moved to sit right beside her. Rebecca finally gave him a tiny glance before she had to avert her gaze away. Her face was stained with tears, eyes red and puffy and cheeks pink, and she refused to look any more vulnerable than she was now. He assessed her completely.

While she faced away from him, he held his arms out and embraced her, Rebecca's head resting on his lower left shoulder. The only viable thing to do in this situation, is to provide comfort. The redhead paused, she blinked and turned her head so that his neck was now visible to her.

"You haven't told anyone else this at all, haven't you?" His voice was quiet as he spoke, he felt her slowly shake her head and raise a hand to wipe her face again. "You kept it all to yourself?"

A pause before she nodded, sniffing again. She refused to make her emotions as raw and hot as they should be, but Jay already knew she was resisting the need for comfort.

"Let it out."

That was what he told her, Rebecca raised her head slightly to look at the music producer's face. He looked down at her. "You've spent long enough telling yourself that what happens in the past is irrelevant and shouldn't be dwelled on, but it's been hurting you." He said. "It's okay to cry."

She gave him a long look, her eyes already brimming with tears again but this time, she didn't attempt to wipe them away. Rebecca leaned against his again, this time she started to sob quietly. There were many times where she cried over how messed up she was after that incident, but _this_ , this felt different. It felt like _closure;_ it felt like she didn't have to listen to the silence around her even if Jay was quiet the entire time, it didn't feel as cold as it always does. It felt warm.

It felt… Secure.

The more he continued rubbing her back, the more she sobbed. It was out of release, extracting all the bottled up insecurities and worthlessness that she's felt as a human _being_ , and forget about her riches for this moment. After being raped, she felt like she couldn't _hold_ a place in someone's mind other than out of hate, sex or annoyance. Even if she was rich now, and always been rich rather, her heart and soul felt like a drained man on the street: homeless. There was no sense of _homeliness_ in her own body, at her age right now she still had heavy doubts about herself as a woman, especially because it costed her the one thing that she always prances around to care about...

Rebecca shook her head in his shoulder. "It's stupid… to say this and I know that I am... redeemable as a person, but I still feel like _nothing_." She said this through sniffing. "It completely ruined me. I can't even…" She couldn't get her words out in one sentence, she cried even harder. "I can't even have kids either."

The she sat up, and looked up while wiping her face. "I mean, I never really thought I wanted children but… I didn't want that taken away from me in that way."

Her voice broke even more as she said that; fertility wasn't something of importance to her because she didn't care enough to have kids, but with the way she was violated… it felt like her existence was meaningless if she's been used in such a manner already. She started pouring out to him, and he listened and comforted her since that was the only viable thing he could do, and after a quarter of an hour Rebecca had finally picked herself up.

Jay watched as she would look down at the ground and then shake her head to herself, as if ridding the rest of those memories out of her system rather than out of repression. Rebecca stopped holding herself and sat normally, clasping her hands against her thighs and sniffing the rest of her tears away. She then looked up at him, and smiled weakly with a tiny chuckle.

"I'm sorry for keeping you up a bit longer."

"Why are you apologizing?" Jay blinked thrice. "There is no need to. It's fine."

She averted her gaze from him, and Jay inhaled before reaching out to take hold to her chin, allowing her to look at him. "What happened was not your fault. I know you already know this, but you don't feel it at all; you're not unworthy of _anything_ because of that incident. I know I've been a dick for so long but… if you were traumatized to the point of not being able to recognize impulses," which is what she told him, her actions became more erratic and she often times either doesn't remember them, or feels heavy guilt over what she did, "then I can vouch for it. Please remember, that none of this was your fault, Rebecca."

A rare, warm, and comforted smile crossed her features. Even though her face was tear stained, her green eyes still brightened from what he said, and those words held a _lot_ of weight for her. Especially if she factored in the things she's done… to him, out of petty reasoning, and the way she acts around certain people and giving off the wrong body language ninety percent of the time, and with the fact that Jay had lost much of his money due to her… And yet here he was, understanding where she came from…

She couldn't help it, she pulled him in for a tight hug, which made Jay grunt a little over the force. She even ended up toppling over him by accident, and giggling over it.

"At least don't suffocate me, dude." He said.

She raised her head to look down at him, and shook her head with a budding smile over just… _him_. "You're such a good person, Jay."

"Eh, it's…" he shrugged, "It's part of the resume."

She laughed and got off of him, standing up and fidgeting with her sweater a bit before yawning. "I… think I lost a lot of energy crying and stuff."

Jay sat up. "Yup." He nodded, and did a head-nod to the door. "You need sleep at this point."

He was saying that because she now looked like if she laid on his bed for more than a minute, she'd knock out on the spot. "You're right…" She stretched. "Goodnight, Jay."

The Mandalan nodded, leaning back as he watched the redhead woman approach his door. She stopped while opening it, and turned around to look at Jay. "...Thank you, again. It… means a lot to me."

This was a showing of gratitude; Rebecca had finally come clean with something that she's been repressing for years now. He can identify, with the shame she had shown, that she didn't want anyone really close to her to know just because it would change their perception of her. She already knows Jay has no business spreading other people's situations like a high school kid, and even if he wasn't a firsthand victim, he's had a few friends that were. To deem her experience fruitless because it happened so long would be telling her to _deal with it_ ; there's no way one can just move on from something like that. Jay can vouch for her, indeed.

He gave her a tiny smile. "You're welcome." With that, the doctor left the room, closing the door completely on her way out.

She looked around the motel hallway, the large stretch of light beige was brought out by the moonlight, there were portions of the hallway that had glass ceilings, letting in the blue-purple rays of Desna's moon. She walked through the halls to get to her room, eyes wandering as if she had a clearer outlook on the atmosphere around her. Somehow, she did; somehow, everything around her wasn't making her feel crammed or stuck or anxious, somehow taking a moment to look around her while she was at ease brought in the calming aftermath of a release she so desperate needed. Her face was short of nothing but relaxed, she no longer felt a heavy burden upon herself like she almost always does, and the feeling itself became more commonplace than she would like to admit. She felt… light...

She hasn't felt this way in many, many years, and it's a treasure to finally feel light again.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **We now learn that Rebecca's psyche has been damaged by sexual assault, though it is noteworthy to point out that recovering from that does not take months. It was a one time event, it will take longer for her to heal emotionally from the abuse since it wasn't repetitive; it was short term. Long term victims have already adapted to the abuse and adapted coping mechanism to function amidst it ongoing; they normally have been desensitized to the trauma and what it entails. Short term victims are more prone to feeling ashamed, so they do not look directly at someone else when unearthing their experience, long term victims have compartmentalized their minds due to desensitization. Just thought you'd know.**


	35. A Moment In A Minute

**I'm gonna propose something new on behalf of this story. What's going to happen here is not that it will be discontinued, but it will be continued** _ **separately**_ **from this story link once chapter 40 comes out.**

 **So when 40 hits, this fanfic's update will stop, but the story itself will continue, kinda like a second Act type deal. At least it will be easier to sift through, at least on my part.**

 **That's all I had to say. Huehue.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **A Moment In a Minute**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Zamasu's room the next morning was beautifully lit up with the natural rays of the orange-tint sun. He was reading a bunch of things on his phone, deciding to suit himself with the nitfy-quick technology of this world. To benchmark, the highest average download speed in our planet is around 86 megabits per second. Desna's globally advanced in it's own right, average 'internet' download speeds here would be around 250 megs per second _if_ they used the same internet provision as us. That is fucking _fast_.

Zamasu had been reading a lot of pieces and writtens on behalf of the sentient mind and its psychology and how it reacts to certain stimuli like happiness, anger, sex, and trauma. He started delving into trauma as the night progressed, looking at different studies done on behalf of what different forms of trauma can do to an individual. There were many, many factors that could make up someone's reactivity, their personality was a part of it. How many times they were subjected was another, the way their genetic makeup was even is considered on behalf of how someone could cope with trauma. He looked up all of this, he searched through hundreds of articles and writtens just to see, because it was bugging him last night.

Because he accidentally walked by Jay's closed door.

He _accidentally_ stayed there and listened, listened to the sound of her crying, overhearing what she told Jay.

Five months ago, the Zamasu back then would have rolled his eyes and walked off, considering that stupid _weakling_ human emotion as annoying. But he came to know Rebecca; he came to know her through her happy times, her paranoia, her anger, her shade and teas, her isolation and her seldom quietness… but he could never envision her _crying_ …

Except for that one time where she cried over that movie she saw like 800 times, but that was different; _this_ was real crying.

What he heard last night were _raw_ tears being poured out of an individual. He heard everything Rebecca told Jay and realized this was the thing that she _didn't_ want him to know about, out of shame and because she didn't want him to think she was… a whore. Yet Zamasu, even with the information James gave of her, he could never truly associate that trope with her at _all_. But to hear this…

Why the _fuck_ would a living breathing being _violate_ someone like that?! When everything subsided, he left Jay's door in a heat of fury over how unfair her past was. Sure, she may have been rash enough to hurt Adrian in ways he didn't know about, but _nothing_ and _nobody_ deserves to be forced onto like that. Rape was not an act for the sake of _comeuppance_ or for the righting of karma, which was what Rebecca believed. But luckily enough, Jay was there, he was there to comfort her and tell her that she wasn't the means to her experience.

It was like a flip-flop of feelings for him; he felt pure anger towards those _beasts_ that hurt Rebecca as a teen, and he had the utmost respect for how Jay handled the information because he knows that he himself would have sought out those terrible people just to give them the _God's Hand_. So here he was, it was 11:56 in the morning, just finishing another written on abuse victims before he turned off his phone and headed out of his room.

He already heard everyone else talking within the lounge room, and he went down to see Lexi, Ashley, Jay, and… _Irene_ sitting on the sofas and couches. Ashley was sitting on Adrian's lap, and James was sitting next to Irene which _would_ have been quite weird to Zamasu had he not known of the situation between the two.

"Good morning." Zamasu said, and he was regarded with a mix of 'good mornings', 'hello's and 'hi's. And then Irene spoke…

"Wasabi!"

It's like _fucking clockwork_ with this woman, god dammit. And she had the nerve to get up and act all cordial and shit… _ugh_. "Do not waste your time standing up to attempt to touch me, after calling me _that._ "

She raised a brow. "What's wrong with the name?"

"I _know_ what Wasabi is. It's spicy and not pleasant." Zamasu frowned deeply. "That is the _opposite_ of me."

"Zamasu, she's just fucking with you on purpose. Let it go at least." Jay waved at him. "I don't want no arguments _before_ eating some food."

"Speaking of which," Out came Ashley, who skipped into the living room with a big smile on her face, "Room service is coming in… a minute." She looked down at her phone.

"How do you know?" James looked at her.

"There's an app this resort has that gives you all types of tourist stuff, like room service arrivals, buses, locations, all that jazz." Adrian answered for Ashley.

"I'm gonna download _thaaaat_." James whipped out his own phone and went to the app store. "So, how was your sleep, Zamasu?"

"I didn't sleep." Zamasu said. "I was reading all night." James nodded in acknowledgement.

"About what?" Jay _just so happened_ to quietly ask, how coincidental.

Zamasu shrugged however, keeping his explanations minimal. "Just random stuff, I was just stumbling upon things on the Web."

"Oh." Jay said.

Lexi looked over at him and sneered. "You've _already_ developed the habit of _nighttime surfing_."

"You're no better, Lex'." Adrian gave her a playful look, and she supplanted that with a playful shove to his bicep. "Be careful, my girlfriend is sitting on me. If you keep doing that, you might injure her."

"I'm hitting _you_ , you nutcase."

"Don't use me as a scapegoat, Adrian." Ashley flicked her boyfriend in the forehead.

The producer winced, but straight faced his testy girlfriend. "Well so much for keeping you _safe_."

"You three are something else." Zamasu shook his head, and that was when their bell rang. As quick as light, James sprung up and ran like Sonic.

"I GOT IIIIIT!" He went to open the door and let the _four male carriers_ come in with four whole carts of various foods. They greeted everyone shortly (thought stopping for a minute when they saw the obvious green guy standing), and moved the dishes on the large kitchen countertop table. The others watched in _hunger_ as the guys swiftly finessed the placement of the dishes before bidding them a kind farewell. The second the guys left, closing the door behind them, the group of eight men and women's eyes went straight to the table.

"Soooo…. Are we gonna take turns, or treat this like a buffet?" James asked the others. It took a moment before the humans came to a quick decision simultaneously.

" _Buffet."_

They took plates and sat in the large dining area, eating and chatting amongst each other. While Zamasu took a bite out of his scrambled eggs, he frowned. "Where is Rebecca?"

"She went out for a walk earlier." Lexi said. Jay was noticeably quiet.

"'Becca said she'll be back like, later in the afternoon or something." Irene shrugged.

"She woke up in a really good mood today." Lexi smiled. "She was jumping everywhere when I saw her earlier. I actually never seen her like that."

"Me neither." Irene looked down at her food. "She probably met a new guy. I've been _waiting_ for her ass to get off the single boat."

Lexi and Irene laughed, though Adrian, James, Ashley, and even Jay shared chuckles as well. Zamasu didn't laugh, because it was Irene; she didn't understand the gravity of Rebecca's life, but he refrained from being upset over it. The rest of the noon was chilled out; once everyone had finished Adrian offered to do the dishes while they all left to explore the place. Jay _abruptly_ opted to help him out as well, and Zamasu caught that as quick as it came. He gave Lexi a sweet kiss before she, Irene, and Ashley embarked on their misadventures. James, on the other hand went upstairs to change and he'll more than likely be taking a lone tour around the place. He's had a lot on his mind lately.

When Zamasu peeked into the kitchen, he saw Jay leaning against the counter next to Adrian, telling him something.

"...kinda questioning it right now. I mean, she's told me some things that… I can't say to you due to their nature but I dunno how to feel anymore." And then he started gesturing.

To Adrian, whenever Jay gestures while discussing something conflicting, he's mostly unsure about it. The Mandalan continued. "I've had friends who've gone through this stuff who end up acting in ways they never would, and yes it changes them for life, but…"

"Are you saying her trauma makes her act out?" Adrian was lathering plates as he frowned at Jay.

"I'm not _excusing_ her completely, but yes." Jay said. "Mace has told me in many criminal cases that he's done, those who are victims of abuse find that their actions are mostly compulsive. Some of these criminals do shit and can't recall why or even if they done it. But Rebecca's been through some fucked up shit, and if it's enough to make her all… you know..."

"I won't ask what exactly it is." Adrian said. "But when did this event even happen?"

"A week after you two broke up."

"Hmm…" He looked back down at the clean dishes. There were several more to go.

"She says she's been trying to turn a new leaf for a few years now." Jay looked down.

"Is this you reconsidering the shade you throw at her all the time?" Adrian smirked at him.

"Not really." Jay chuckled a bit. "I'm just confused as to why… _I_ had to know about this. I'm not even her friend."

"She probably didn't have anyone viable to turn to."

Both Adrian and Jay whipped their head to see Zamasu standing just outside of the kitchen. The Kaioshin had spoke up in the middle of their conversation. "Her only best friend is Irene. I doubt she would handle the situation as well as you did, Jay. The same with Lexi."

"But Irene is her bestie, though. She should be of open ears to her." Adrian frowned.

"You really think Irene could be serious in anything?" Zamasu straight faced. "The woman finds humor in everything."

" _Please_ don't tell me you're trying to say Irene can't take shit seriously, and she can't be trusted with something." Adrian held a hand up. "That's what it sounds like you're saying."

"You wouldn't be wrong." Zamasu shrugged, and this was where Adrian frowned deeply.

But Jay answered for Adrian. "Don't get upset, Adrian."

"I'm not, I'm not, it's just _weird_ to me." The music producer shook his head. "It's been a burden on Jay too."

"No it hasn't!"

"Bro you've been _way too quiet_ this whole morning." Adrian gave him a wary look. "But still, I wouldn't hold whatever happened to her against her or anything, if it was that bad. I just find this weird."

"Maybe you need to go out with the rest of us to clear your little head, Adrian." Jay smiled and knocked on Adrian's forehead. "After you finish these dishes, of course."

"Mayhaps, Adrian," Zamasu walked in to place a hand on Adrian's shoulder, "She simply wanted to get it out of her chest at that time, and Jay was the only one awake. Don't overthink this."

"I ain't, I aint." Adrian smiled downwards. "On another note though, where are we gonna hit up after this?"

"You know that bar that's like a mile away? _There_." Jay's smile widened as Adrian looked at him. He knows Adrian absolutely _loves_ bars. "But first, we can cruise around the area with uhh… James?"

Jay called out to the baseball, who was just in the midst of jogging into the living room. "What?"

"Are you traveling around alone?" Jay asked.

Zamasu turned to the basketball player. "Yeah? Why? You three wanna come along?"

"Yup." Adrian smiled. He turned off the sink and dried his hands off with a towel. "We can leave right now I mean… I'm already technically ready."

Technically, they were _all_ ready; they didn't need to pamper themselves to go and traverse Intima's resort. The first thing James did was rev up one of the guest cars in the large lot and he came around to the entrance of their motel to pick them all up.

Zamasu and Jay exchanged brief looks at one another. The four of them were heading out to the giant snow park in the resort, and on their way there they ran into Rebecca. She was more than likely returning back home since she was going in the opposite direction of the guest car.

The doctor had texted Lexi earlier and the model told her that everyone was going out to explore the place. Now, she was on the phone with someone of covert nature, but the guest car stopped right next to her and she looked down to see Adrian, Zamasu and Jay greeting her.

"Rebecca." Zamasu gave her a tiny smile. "Do you want James to drive you back?"

"You cool with that, James?" Adrian looked at the basketball player.

James shrugged. "I wouldn't have a problem with it, we're only about ten minutes away from the motel."

Almost instantly when she heard James' voice, she quickly told the person on the phone 'I'll call you back'. It was inconspicuous to the others, however, except for Jay. Jay narrowed his eyes as she spoke. "Nope, I'm good you guys. You don't need to take me back, I can walk from here."

"You sure?" Jay asked. He leaned against the car window, and Rebecca shook her head.

"Yep, I'm sure." She then proceeded to walk away. "Go ahead and have fun, you guys." She waved them goodbye, with them returning the favor as James obliviously drove by.

Jay casted a look back at the retreating doctor, before turning to the others who were discussing random stuff. Now mayhaps it was just his _skepticism_ getting to him but she looked a lot more suspicious than he had anticipated. Again, it was weird; he understood her having to put the conversation on hold, but since she decided to walk off on her own, why would she _end_ a continuing call? Now she'll have to call the other person back like thirty seconds later, and why did she hang up when they came around to talk to her?

It's as if the person on the other end of the line should _not_ know who she was talking to, as if their association should be kept a secret. He could understand himself doing that, but… what was _she_ hiding?

Gosh, wasn't he the one to tell Adrian to stop worrying? Now the word is up his ass, now _he_ feels like he'll have to look into this. Even Zamasu hasn't noticed, and he more than likely would tell the God directly…

Jay sighed, he _really_ needs to stop getting so concerned about little shit.

'' **: '' : '' : '' : '' : '' : '' : '' :''**

"Regan."

Bee watched as they brought the prestigious lockman into the room. Yesterday when they asked on behalf of Regan, he wasn't actually in the FPICA interrogation rooms, they said he'll be relocated within the next twenty four hours. The rest of the AIs did depart, with Amethyne and Chandler looking into the actual bomb. The make was some sort of militant trace around, peculiarly the same construction as one of the bombs made like seventy four years ago, AGG90. It was a model used in the Seven Years War, big enough to decimate hundreds of miles of land. Had that bomb went off, ninety percent of East City would have been a radioactive aftermath.

Now today, within the actual interrogation grounds, stood Bee, Rogue, Chandler, Genyne, and Netryne. The five super-AI's stood side-by-side, Bee floating in midair, and Mace was personally sitting on the other end of the interrogation chair. Now usually, some other interrogator is here to deal with criminals and criminals that sent _personally_ to this building ought to piss their pants over how screwed they are. If you end up in this building after committing something, you are probably going to the _highest_ tier prisons out there, not to mention the actual _director_ is the one talking to you. Yup, Regan is screwed.

The lockman was told to sit across from Mace's stern and intimidating face, and Regan himself looked _all around_ the room as he made his way to the table. The second he sat down, all the anxiety was literally washed off of his face and looked as neutral as ever.

Bee's lined eyes brightened at the sight, it was as if something _legitimately_ came over him just now. The five AIs peeped his calmed actions.

Mace folded his hands against the table. "There was an incursion in the upper northside of East City, we've found a bomb that's been safelocked within Gin street." Mace sounded very nonchalant, and what he was saying was not so testy, but he was _serious_. The room around them was stiff. "Now when we traced the bomb's model in order to find out where and who it came from, it led us to you." Then he leaned forward. " Were you the only one behind this sabotage?"

Mace had a feeling there was more than one person here, but a criminal with Regan's brain wouldn't have problem with getting a blueprint of that bomb's caliber. The lockman himself did not look anxious, he was calm and all he did was take a leisure breath in, and out.

"Yes."

The five AI's were psychoanalyzing this man. Again, they couldn't find anything in his body language that pointed back to the anxiety he had when he walked in. He looked like a completely different person. Mace blinked, already intrigued by the fact that this man just ratted himself out that quickly. "You did?"

A nod.

"You were the sole proprietor of putting the bomb there, running away with your group of lackeys?" A nod. "And you kept your tracks out to us; did you think you would get away with how conspicuous the scheme was?"

"I reckon I wouldn't." Regan spoke, _completely_ unlike himself. "And it wouldn't take long for you all to latch onto that sabotage itself. Whatever happens, happens."

Bee shook his head at Regan's _eerily_ monotone voice. He almost sounded like a robot. Mace furrowed a brow. "What was your reasoning behind it? Why'd you do it?"

"For reasons that none of you will ever find out." Regan said. "Everything that is done so far will not be uttered to the rest of you, your crime investigations will led to no avail."

The man beside Mace started getting really annoyed with Regan's smug, smartass attitude. " _Uh-huh_ , with all the people that we've incarcerated so far, I think you'd ought to hold your ton-"

"Calm down, Hess." Mace raised a hand to the bigger man. The director knew Regan was trying to evoke emotion out of him, trying to get him to break, but that wasn't going to work. Now, he had more concern over whether or not this was a front on his behalf, or if this was _actually_ Regan himself talking. He didn't look like the type of dude to say what's he saying right now. "Where did you even seek help from? We know the people you had under your belt were associated with the black vans."

"That is of no importance to you."

"It _is_ of importance to me."

"Why so?"

Mace's eye started to twitch, but he refrained. "If you are affiliated with these people, speak your piece before you get thrown behind bars."

"Whether I say anything or not, the outcome will not change, won't it?" Regan's voice was scarily quiet, like he was right next to Mace's ear when he said that. There was no smile on his face either, this _whole_ time he had a straight face. "If I go to jail, then I go to jail. So what of you could make me spill out any 'secrets' you all want?"

Oooh, this is hard. Chandler narrowed his eyes, they were dealing with somebody who knows their expendability, and doesn't give a shit about it. The yellow AI gently shook his head as Mace continued. "You're going to make this difficult for yourself. I'm sure your _boss_ won't like the fact that you've got caught so quickly under the eyes of the law."

At the mere mention of boss, the director noticed Regan sort of sit up all the sudden, but then he retracted back into that monotone timbre again. "I have no boss."

"Oh, but I'm sure you do." Mace narrowed his eyes. "You don't know the ropes of how a criminal's plan works, that much is shown with how quickly you got caught. That smug attitude of yours will not get you anywhere if you don't give us any more details."

Unbeknownst to Mace, there was a small coiled chip that was located on the very beginning of Regan's spine, right below his cranium. It outwardly was brown to camouflage with the color of his hair, and looked like a small nearly invisible button. It ran on behalf of a timer, and the timer was getting smaller and smaller. It was only at one minute at this point, and due to the connection it had with some of his crucial neurotransmitters, it was having a tiny effect on Regan's body overall. Notably, his head would feel cool and hot repeatedly, and his fingertips went cold.

"I am not to go anywhere anyway." He started sounding more robotic, Regan's eyes were now lost of emotion. Smugness, and sneery were all _gone_ in the blink of an eyes. "After this, I will be sent to jail for a brief moment, and then I will return."

"Return?" Mace frowned. "You tried to secretly threaten the lives of millions of people. You are looking forward to _life_ in jail."

"I will return." Now he started blinking, as if his eyes were getting dry. Mace leaned back a bit, he didn't notice that Regan's sclera was _very very white_. "You will never find me, afterwards. I'll be lurking in the shadows, but you will never see me."

Ten seconds to his timer was now being countdown. Regan no longer felt his face.

"Do you really think that's gonna scare us?" Hess spoke up now, the bald buff man frowning annoyed at this robotic human. "You might as well spill before you're thrown in the square." The square is another term for a prisoner's cell.

"Nothing good will come out of you keeping this a secret, Regan." Mace shook his head. "You aren't doing this on your own, speak on behalf of whoever is controlling you-"

Mace couldn't even finish his sentence before he noticed, _just like that_ , that Regan's eyes were going to the back of his head. Hess went around the table, but just before he got to where Regan was, the man started gripping his head and flailing in his own seat. Regan let out a strangled scream, violently thrashing in his seat. Hess attempted to hold him as Mace stood up in alarm, and the five silent AIs also approached Regan. He swung at Hess involuntarily, and literally held the table with both his hands before slamming his head into its metal surface.

"What the fu-" Mace had to stop. Regan started _repeatedly_ slamming his head. "Hess, guys, hold him down!"

Hess grabbed Regan's hands to put them behind his back, restricting Regan's headbanging movements while Rogue and Chandler held his shoulders. Now Regan was shaking his head, almost to the point where they'd _reckon_ he'd get whiplash, all the while sounding like he couldn't breathe. Nobody's holding him by the chest, but he still was having trouble breathing. Genyne came up to at least try to grip the man's face to see if she can garner some neurological causes behind this reaction, but Regan was still attempting to shake himself off.

In fact, he was trying so hard that the force of him jerking away made the other hear a loud crack. The lockman had dislocated his own shoulder, and didn't even realize it.

Now, _both_ Mace and Netryne held onto the front of his shoulders and Regan suddenly looked up with a strained expression on his face. His jaw was in a position where his neck muscles were tensed, and Mace, Chandler, Bee and Netryne had to back away a little from what they saw.

This might be the creepiest interrogation Mace has ever been apart of, and that is rare on his part. Regan's once brown pupils were now completely white. His face was pale, but so pale that you can see the color of the veins on his temple. His face was literally shaking, he had his mouth parted slightly as if he needed air, and he looked like he was suffering from a very bad case of nystagmus.

"Fan him, fan him now!" Mace started waving his hand until Bee flew around to get a few folders so that the others can use it to fan him. Chandler knew the symptoms behind this behavior and he was shaking his head even more so now that it became clear as day to him.

"Get him to breathe." The yellow AI instructed. "His brain is overheating, he needs to breathe."

Hess moved forward while Rogue and Netryne went to put his hands to his sides. The bald man started to give him CPR, and after a minute or so, Regan started breathing normally. Mace rescinded his questioning for a moment, more concerned about _what the fuck_ just happened. When Regan regained his breathing, the man started frantically looking all around in a state of delirium, he didn't recognize any reason as to why he was here.

Now they had released the majority of his hold on the man because now he was getting anxious from being bombarded with like seven different faces looking at him in confusion. Chandler, Netryne, Hess, Rogue, and Genyne all backed away from the man and allowed him to look around at least, he seemed to be having a panic attack. He held his chest, he held his head and then felt for his face and neck. Regan's eyes showed that he was seeing something other than seven individuals who were trying to resuscitate him.

In his mind's eye, he saw the black lab and dark faces. He felt the crawling sensations in his chest, neck and face, the man was reliving the experience of being _there_ once again.

"Regan?"

His hearing was blurred out because he could only watch as he saw scalpels being shown in front of him, the sharp ends glistening in the bright screen light that sat a few feet on top of him. The dark faces started to circle and get closer, but his eye movements were erratic. He can feel the bad vibes these people were giving him.

"...Are you there? Regan?"

That was a different voice, but now he smelled the scent of blood and felt the coolness against the back of his neck. The scalpel smelled of clean iron and freshly cut skin, he didn't know what that smelled like until he was _there_.

Chandler now stood in front of Regan, trying to grab the man's attention. His eyes returned to being brown again. "He's reliving something, guys." The yellow AI proceeded to touch his neck, but that completely _paralyzed_ Regan. Now he was in complete fear, but he himself was unable to speak, the man was catatonic. "Shit…"

"What are you trying to do, Chandler?" Mace frowned at the AI.

"I'm looking for the source of this problem." Chandler said. "He's being partially controlled by something."

"I'm sure there's a failsafe somewhere on his body." Rogue said. "If Chandler gets near it, it could be turned off completely."

This knowledge came from the datum that Chandler was given when he was a stationary computer, on behalf of an experiment that was taking place in the past. Its gruesome nature was something Chandler refused to dwell on, but this was a common reaction to a thwarted control process of a human being. Even though Regan was completely still, Chandler wasn't trying to render him catatonic; he knew that going near the area of trauma would make Regan still, but once he found the area he was sure the lockman would stop reliving the trauma once more.

Chandler touched the back of Regan's neck, raising his own vibrations to interfere with the coil that was in his lower cranium. Once he had desensitized the coil, Regan stopped being still, and he blinked back into reality. He looked around the place in a less frenzied manner, his breathing had calmed down, and then he looked to the five individuals looking down at him, with Chandler and Mace being right next to him.

"Where am I?" He almost didn't look over to where Mace was, but when he did he damn near jumped out of his seat.

"Hey hey, calm down man." Mace raised a hand to keep the man from getting a damn heart attack so young. "You're in the FPICA interrogation room."

 _Now_ this was the Regan Bee knew. Regan started to shake but in fear because _bitch, he was in trouble_. "F-f-for what?"

"For the bomb sabotage in northside East City." Genyne spoke up. That made Regan's eyes go wide, a bomb was placed in East City? What did he have to do with this?

"T-there was a b-b-bomb in East City?" Regan shook his head, incredulous. "How? I don't even- I don't know how- why would…"

He literally was struggling to find the right words partially because he was scared, and because his mind had just gotten out of a dissociative state. Mace looked at Bee, Bee looked at him _and_ Chandler, and everyone exchanged looks at one another. Regan _seriously_ didn't remember anything that had just occurred.

They could see it in his body language that he was confused. Netryne cooled the situation down, her smooth voice making Regan look back at her. "I'm sure you're probably in a bit of stupor right now. We had pinned the bomb's model just recently and traced the combination back to you and your doing. From what our data tells us," she paused, "You were the one responsible for the bomb itself."

Regan looked like he was going to piss himself. "Nonononononono, I couldn't have done that. I don't even remember making a bomb or anything, I-I'm just a locksmith! I-I-umm…" He looked around the room once more.

"Okay." Rogue raised a hand in calming the frightened man down. _Now_ they knew he was a fall guy behind this. "There was something we found regarding your lack of presence in the world. You used to work for Grimzy, but you had disappeared in an interval of around two years." At this mention, Regan nodded violently. "Can you explain what that was about?"

Mace liked that Rogue, Bee, Chandler and the rest of the AIs were here, they were better at dissecting human behavior at its core.

"I was taken." Regan said. "By these people in dark, weird suits. And they took me to this place… I-I don't know where the place is." Suddenly he started to stutter, because he _knew_ where the place was, but he couldn't say anything. They were _watching_ him. "But I was taken and they took my blood samples and started doing this thing called 'bleedwashing' to me."

 _Everybody's_ eyes went wide. "They did _that_ to you?!"

Regan nodded. Bleedwashing in simple terms is a form of torture where the victim is subjected to physical abuse near a source of water. They were talked into a way of thinking through insults and orders, and immediately after the assault would stop the victim's whole body was submerged into a body of water. They were brought back up after exactly 19 seconds, almost at the point of unconsciousness, and the process would repeat.

This was not a flub, Chanlder knew that. Nobody in the general public, even with the deepest of research, knew what _bleedwashing_ was. _This_ was _real_.

"Were there… Were there more people that went through as well?" Mace asked.

"U-U-uhh…" Regan shook his head at first, as if fighting with himself. "T-there were a lot of people, like a lot of criminals and such who were taken, b-but uhh… I can't say any more."

"Regan," Bee approached the associate, who just realized he was here, "No one is here right now. We are all open ears to this information. We need this to stop the small party that perpetuates these acts."

"Bee… Bee you _have_ to understand." He suddenly got on his knees. Even though Bee wasn't tall or anything, Regan was on his knees in front of everyone else. "You all have to understand, this isn't some small group. They have, they have stations _worldwide_ , these people have-have been taking in random criminals and doing all kinds of crazy stuff to them. You have to understand-" Regan was literally _crying_ , he was tearing while speaking to all of them. "They're trying to rally up an entire army by doing what they did to me, they are _not human!"_

Mace looked between the AIs and Regan. Hess looked at Mace himself, and Chandler looked at the director too. The yellow AI looked back at Regan, who was now sobbing but being comforted with the help of Bee.

"Regan," Bee floated in front of the man, "Regan, look at me." Regan sniffed, but looked down at the kind Indigo AI. "Thank you for the information. I promise you we'll take this and we'll use this to get rid of those people who tortured you."

"Bee," Regan reiterated, "They are _not_ human. They have powers that could nullify human thinking-"

"Have you forgotten that we were once combat AI?" Bee placed his hands on his hips. "We are _much too_ strong with our new chassis, Regan. You don't need to worry about us."

"What are their directives?" Genyne asked. "What are they planning to do?"

He looked up at the green female AI. "T-they want to wage war on the rest of the world." Regan struggled. "T-they wanna destroy everything and everyone with their army, and they've rounded up a lot of strong drugs and powerful people for it. Oh my god…" Regan looked down at the ground. "I'm going to die… they're all gonna die…"

"Regan, we'll keep you safe, alright?" Rogue reassured. "Come with us, okay. We're all gonna go and report this to the others. Yellow." He looked at Chandler.

"What?"

"Keep the vibrations up." Rogue instructed. "We don't know if this thing is going to trigger something in him."

"Right." Chandler said. "Everyone else, come with us. Mace," The AI looked at him, "I'll give you more details on behalf of what this might be. I think this might have a longer history than we all thought it did."

"Thank you." Mace smiled at him, and then turned to Regan before Hess and everyone out with him. "Everything is going to be alright, Regan. Trust me."

Far away, _millions of miles_ above Desna's atmosphere sat a camouflaged, hyperspace ship that looked in on the premise that Regan was in. Just recently, he was told that they had sent out the innocent locksmith after his programming was finished, and the mise proved to be mostly successful in convicting him for prison. Shigeru's assertion of Regan's location was faulty, however, Regan was not supposed to be sought after by the _FPICA_ director himself.

That was not something the _Eminent_ would want to happen.

The henceman himself, Tendro, watched as he at first composed himself in a robotic persona, and under the orders of Jirude himself, he decided that it was time for Regen's programming to fail. Tendro pressed a button to sent a hypersonic wave to interfere with the coil around his neck, and Regan was soon found to shut down and started harming himself in an attempt to 'get rid' of the programming itself. Tendro watched the interaction between him, the director, Chandler and everyone else before turning to a hologram that showcased the Eminent's face.

"It is done, Eminent _._ "

"Good." Jiruda crossed his arms. Now, both sides have information as to how this all will play. Once again, he was mostly laissez faire, but that didn't mean he could pick the pieces that he wanted to move around in this little _chess game_ of destruction.

He smirked to himself… humans are so _gullible_ , oftentimes.

 **-X-**

Lexi took to exiting out of the store that she was previously in. It had been three days into staying at the resort, but she hadn't calmed down from _buying_ souvenirs. As she went out the automatic doors, the model was laughing over the phone at the person she was talking to.

"Look, it isn't _unlike_ me to go out and buy souvenirs, okay?"  
"Haven't you already done that three days ago?"

She rolled her eyes at the man on the other hand. "One day of shopping _ain't enough."_

"Geez." He playfully remarked. The engineer had an earpiece on since he was busying cooking himself a nice breakfast that Lexi unfortunately asked about, and more than unfortunately could not partake in. "Aside from that, I'm sure you're having fun, aren't you?"

"Yup." Lexi smiled. "Umm… Ambrose, I got a question."

"Sure."

"You know who Zamasu is?" She had to make sure Zamasu wasn't bluffing and sure, the God himself would never _lie_.

"The green guy?" Ambrose's detailed description of him made her chuckle. "Yes; he came into my lab by accident one day."

"And that's how you guys met?"

"Mm-hmm." Golden eyes looked down at the skillet before him. "He keeps visiting every once in a while."

"On your behalf?"

"Nope. He just comes at random times."

Lexi shook her head. "I'll hit him for you, that's rude."

The engineer chuckled. "I don't really mind it. He's a nice person."

"But _still_ ," Lexi got really defensive, "He shouldn't just _waltz_ in to your place like that. I mean I know he's a God and all-"

"Lexi."

Instantly, she went quiet. "...Yes?"

He laughed. His laugh was so warm. "It's _okay_ , he's not hurting me or anything. Settle your kettle."

She snorted. "Fine, fine, I am _settled_." Lexi looked down with a smile on her face. "But he gets real dreamy when I talk about you. I think he misses your presence."

Ambrose recalled the last encounters he's had with this God before. He chuckled to himself. "I wouldn't disagree on that. Perhaps, if I'm not busy, I can head over there for a visit. I mean, unless of that resort you booked is strictly reserved."

It wasn't, but Lexi knew damn well that all Ambrose had to do was s _how his face_ , and they would let him in without a question. He has _that_ much gusto. "That would be great! The rest of my friends finally get to meet you!"

That made the engineer chuckle a bit. The idea of meeting Lexi's friends sounded quite nice, and Lexi would be more than elated to see his face again, because he's hot.

"I bet it would. Unfortunately, I gotta take my leave now."

Lexi felt soured. "Aww, really?"

"Yup." Ambrose nodded. "There is stuff I have to update."

He makes it sound like he was gonna go update his Minecraft server or something irrelevant. "What are you gonna build?"

There was a pause, Ambrose looked away. "My lab needs a new solar field."

"A what?"

 _Annnnd_ he expected her to say that. "A thingy that captures sunlight as energy."

"Oh." Lexi giggled. "My bad."

"Why apologize? You didn't know." Ambrose shrugged. "Alright, I'm off. I'll see you in sometime."

Lexi smiled down at her phone. She really, really didn't want him to leave, he was so _interesting_ to talk to. Even with the nerdy shit that she barely understands, she would always inquire on that despite remaining confuzzled. Hopefully, he does come by, she really misses seeing his face even if it was a week ago, she just loves his energy.

Reluctantly, her thumb hovered over the end call button. "Bye, Ambrose…"

Intima had _a lot_ to offer. On the second day, Zamasu had went to the snow park with the guys, followed by hitting up that bar Jay promised they'd go to. Now it was in the middle of day five of his stay here, and to say Zamasu had been wandering _everywhere_ was not an overstatement.

The Kaioshin found himself in a room that was very lofty and really… weird. The floors were polished wood and there was little to nothing extra in the room. There was a nightstand drawer next to the bed, and the bed itself was huge and very comfortable looking. There were curtained wall windows on the opposite side of where he was standing, and the lights were white. But there was one thing, no, two things that stood out in the room; the lack of accessories, and the placement of mirrors.

The headboard of the large bed, despite being well taken cared of and elegantly polished, had a mirror installed into it in the middle. There was another large mirror that was installed on the ceiling above the bed which made no sense, the Kaioshin raised a brow weirdly. Now, the accessories weren't even accessories; this hotel had two silken robes hanging in the bathroom that was connected to this room which was huge and luxurious. From where he was standing, he could see the shower had a glass sliding door with booths inside where you can sit, not like a bathtub. There were lights on the shower head, and a separate one that a person can hold and move around. The bathtub itself was round and it had jets in it, though he could only see a portion of this because of where he was standing.

So he moved to where the bed was and got a full view of the entire shower which looked much bigger than he expected. That was it; there were some towels and bottles of which he assumed was soap, and that's all that was in the bathroom. He looked at the nightstand and opened it, seeing an assortment of fresh razors and weird small bottles in it. There was a mini-fridge, and some tea/coffee making facilities on the farther part of the room. There was a music player as well.

Zamasu went to the tea maker and looked over the assortments of tea herbs. He frowned, they all had weird names but essentially are just white, green, black and red teas. "Uhh…" What the heck is this place? He continued walking around, into the bathroom, sitting on the bed, looking up at the mirror and opening the mini fridge, until he felt and heard vibration against his left pocket. He pulled out his phone, which _conveniently_ was with him this whole time. When he saw that it was Lexi's ID, he answered the phone real quick.

"Hello?"

Again, her voice sounded exquisite on the other end. Zamasu shook his head.

"Zamasu! How have you been?"

"I've been fine."

"Oh, oh that's sweet. Umm, listen." There was pause on the other hand. "I've been looking for you for like ten minutes, and I seriously can't find you anywhere in the condo. You mind telling me where you are?"

"What is it for?"

"Something." Was all she said. "Can you tell me where you are?"

Could he say he was lost? He just entered this one building that was a good distance from the condo but was still a part of the resort area. "Uhh… I'm at…" He went to the window, pulling a curtain over to see where he was. When he looked out, his excellent eyesight picked up Lexi far ahead of his sight. "I can see you." That sounds creepy.

"Wait, what?" Her noticed her turn around multiple times, and he found it semi-amusing. "Where are you?"

"Umm…" He had to be honest. "I don't know." A pause; _Real descriptive, Zamasu._ "Just turn around, and you'll see a building." She turned but was facing all of the trees. "No, a little to your left- a little to the right again. Okay, do you see a building or something?"

He was peeking out from the curtains so Lexi couldn't see him even if she was right in front of the entrance. She flipped her hair from her face. "Uhh… that's a long walk but okay, I'll come along. Why are you there?"

"I don't... know." He seriously didn't know, but he saw Lexi starting to run towards the building. It wasn't actually a long walk from where she was when she called him, it was a good five minutes, and meanwhile Zamasu took the time to look around and try to figure out why this room looked so weird.

He had given her detail on behalf of what room he was in. While he was standing by the nightstand, luckily having _not_ opened its cabinets he heard the door open.

"Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin turned to see Lexi just peeking into the room, but her eyes were all over the scenery before him.

"Hello." Was all he said and Lexi stepped into the room, eyes roaming all around this area. She peeped everything; the robes, the shavers, the view of the bathroom and its see through shower glass, the bed and the heavy amount of mirrors near it, on it and above it.

In contrast with Zamasu's earlier confused expression, Lexi's cheeks went bright red.

"...Do you know where you are right now?"

He told her he didn't know, but her emphasis made it seem like he should. "No? Why? Isn't this a hotel room?"

Lexi didn't know how to put this, because if Zamasu were to know about this he'd freak. And for him, he would probably scream and run the fuck out of here, best case scenario. But she had to break it to him. "This isn't... A regular hotel room, Zamasu."

Just then, some random guy who was doing tidbits of inspection in all the rooms of this floor came by. The door was partially open, and usually the doors here are always closed for specific reasons. He pushed it opened thinking no one was there but came face to face with Lexi and... A green guy?  
Instantly, he retracted. "O-o-oh, I'm so sorry, Ms. Rayne, I didn't mean to interrupt-"

"No no sir," Lexi quickly reassured, her face already beaming with rosy tints, "He just got lost and ended up here. I'm just about to leave with him."

Zamasu seriously did not understand the big deal here.

The janitor-esque man looked around the hallways before turning to her. "I didn't see him walk in here at all." And then he nodded, "But, you can uhh... Go ahead and leave. Pardon me."

He seemed to understand, but Lexi was still blushing madly. She had a feeling this was going to be what she thought it was, and unfortunately, _she was correct._

"Why were you two so nervous?"

The model looked back at him. If she needed to breathe, _now_ was the time. "Zamasu, this isn't a regular hotel, honey. This is a one night place that couples come to have sex." Her face got more flustered as the calm look on his face cascaded right down to _holy fuck_. "We're in a _sex hotel_ right now."

 _Now_ he understood why that guy came in and started behaving weirdly. It all made sense with the mirrors, even though Zamasu couldn't see a reason as to why you would need so many, and with how big the bed was, and the lack of normal bedroom paraphernalia. If that was the case, then that guy must've walked in and thought that he and Lexi were…

 _Why did this have to happen to_ _ **me**_ _?_

"U-uh… oh…" Zamasu looked away, because his cheeks were getting hot for 'no reason'. Of course, the idea of fornicating with a human sounded disgusting at best, but Lexi is really nice and pretty, and her clothes look really nice on her today, and he's fond of her-

 _BUT NOT LIKE THAT!_ "I-I didn't even know…"

"It's fine, it's fine." Lexi sighed. "Let's just leave before someone else sees us and thinks we're gonna-"

"SHUT IT!" He suddenly yelled, and then he closed his fucking mouth. Ain't no way in hell he wanted anyone to hear _his voice_. "Just… okay." he needed a breath. He needed a _break_. "I'll teleport the both of us out of here. _Now._ "

She fast walked to him and grabbed his hand and he instantaneously transmuted their position. They both appeared in the main living room of the motel, where everyone else was.

James was the first person to speak up. "So you guys decided to just log into the room now?"  
Lexi's face was still pinkened. Jay frowned. "We had no choice."

"Are you okay, Lex'?" Jay backed off from leaning against the wall. "Where were you guys?"

Zamasu decided to answer for Lexi,Zamasu since she was too embarrassed to say anything. Not because he's lucky, but because she thought Zamasu would've been aggravated over such information. He outwardly was handling it better than her, but his brain was still on _I WAS JUST AT A FORNICATING FACILITY WITH LEXI-_ "I was at a love hotel."

"Really?" Adrian flickered his gaze elsewhere for a moment before piquing up. "Where?"

"I have no idea, I don't know the map inherently. I'm sure it should be pointed out somewhere." Because his genius ass didn't look at a map in order to _avoid_ that place. "Why ask?"

Ashley was sitting beside him. She answered out of nowhere. "He just wanted to know." Zamasu blinked… he was asking Adrian that question, why did Ashley answer him? And why did Adrian relent with that, usually he would say something if someone answers his questions…

That's weird.

"How was your little _voyage_ though?" James smirked.

Zamasu threw him a look. "Shut up." He turned to Lexi. "What did you want me for?"

"What?"

"You wanted to ask me something." Lexi blinked with a frown. Adrian brought up the topic for her right before she remembered it. "Well it was something we all wanted to ask. You think you can _watch us spar_ like sometime this week?"

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "You want me to _watch_ you?"

"Yes."

He knew Adrian said that on purpose. "I'd rather _join_ than watch." Zamasu asserted himself, standing tall and upright. "You all would be no match for me."

"Maybe not one on one," Adrian shrugged, "But how about four on one? I'm sure we'll pose some difficulty for ya."

" _Sure."_ The Kaioshin's smirk grew sarcastically. "I'd love to see that hap- wait, _four_ of you?"

Adrian blinked. "Yeah?"

"You, Jay, and Lexi are the only three I reckon can fight." He said. "No one else here is as strong as the three of you."

"Ohhhh I almost forgot," Jay came around to pat Zamasu's shoulder, "Shona is coming."

"Really?" Zamasu's eyebrows quirked up. "Why would you pat my shoulder? You're making it sound like he would be even close to a match for me."

"Oh you know," Jay did it again before letting his hand fall off Zamasu's shoulder, "Because."

Zamasu snorted. "Either way, I can't wait for this little spar session."

"We asked you because we wanted you to decide on behalf of a day." Lexi had finally recuperated. She crossed her arms, deciding to _forget_ what happened. "You think this week would be fine?"

"Mayhaps, five days from now." Zamasu concluded. "When will Shona be here?"

Adrian looked up from his phone, having already texted Shona the actual date. He smiled. "Five days from now."

"Sweet!" Jay smiled. He was already getting pumped up, and Zamasu noticed this. He already reckoned, since Adrian had been living with Jay for a couple to a few years, that Jay had taught him a lot about combat, and fighting in general. From that one brawl (it wasn't even a brawl) at the masseuse parlor, he could see these guys had much more in store for him.

"Don't get _too_ excited, Jay."

Jay paused and gave Zamasu a look. "Let me celebrate."

"Not for long."

"Is that a threat?"

"I wouldn't call it so." The Kaioshin and the producer were now getting into one another's faces. "But I'd beg to differ."

"Speaking in riddles isn't cool, Z." Jay tilted his head. "It won't be long before that smile on your face is wiped off."

Now they were full on bantering. "Excuse you? I'd have you on the floor before you could even _attempt_ to hit me."

"Alright, you two! Geez…" Adrian went in between them. "This isn't the time to banter each other up. We made an oath; _five days_. Don't haste yourselves."

He was saying that because a part of him was about to start bantering as well. A good fight is always a go-to way to strengthen bonds.

"Fine." Zamasu backed off, and so did Jay. Lexi smirked at the men.

"That won't be the last of it, though." She was walking by Zamasu as she said that, and she nudged his arm. Zamasu narrowed his eyes at her, _ooooh_ … she's gonna get it soon.

Do not conflate that with the hotel situation. _Please_ , he's innocent.

"Where's Irene?" Zamasu realized that the room was surprisingly tame. There was nothing _stupid_ polluting it.

"She left and went somewhere with Rebecca." Ashley spoke. It was weird to hear her say something with any mention of Rebecca. The writer herself did not like the doctor at all, she would normally abstain from uttering her existence.

"Why?"

"I dunno." Ashley shrugged. "It might be some girl talk, though. Don't mind it."

Zamasu nodded. Though, for now… he won't mind it, because it doesn't concern him. And even if he thinks that in the very core of his being he won't, he will…

But he won't mind it _for now._

 **/\/\/\/\/\/\**

" _WHY?!"_

"Why what?"

"Why would you do that?!" June exclaimed. "Why would you even go as far as to imagine that? What is _wrong_ with you, Jean?"

Jean stood up for her seat. The woman was wearing a very tight dress shirt with black jeans. Her hair, the same minty blue color as June's, was tied back into a high ponytail. She was June's twin sister, a lot more assertive and _outgoing_ when compared to her. The both of them were affluent in different ways however, but they do share common interests.

"You know, it's quite rare to run into someone like _that_ , June." Jean leaned against the table of June's office. "You called me over here to yell at me?"

"That was _inappropriate!_ " June frowned deeply. "You shouldn't have touched him like that! I may know him and all, but that doesn't give you the right to just _grope_ him!"

"He was pretty attractive!" Jean argued back, she leaned forward emphasizing her point. "You know how I am with the Otherworlders here."

Jean, like June, had a fascination for aliens and extraterrestrials. But _unlike_ June, Jean was downright infatuated with them. While June was a researcher who made many story books on aliens, Jean was someone who would get super attracted to them, and if they're good looking, she'll end up getting horny.

It's quite a normal twin dynamic, to be honest.

"Jean…" June got real close to her twin's face. "He thought _I_ did it, he got super angry at _me_! You can't just take a breather at my office and then opt to allow Zamasu in there for your own selfish needs!" Because of the text exchange Rebecca had with Jean, she already knew the Kaioshin's name. "It looked like a very bad first impression."

"Then the next time you see him, just say that you have a twin sister who wants to get involved with him." Jean smiled, but dialed back when she noticed her sister getting _really pissed_. "Okay, I'm sorry! I promise I won't do it again, alright?"

"You _won't_ do it again, because he'll more than likely stray far away from me for it." June frowned, and then turned away. "I don't like leaving bad first impressions with any of the Otherworlders."

Jean raised a brow. "But why make such a big deal out of it, though?"

"You don't know what _echelon_ of an individual you are dealing with!" June turned right back to give Jean a look. "Some Otherworlders aren't just regular people. They could be on some viable social research."

Or they could be a Galaxy ruling, strongman who could blow up Desna in mere seconds. Why hasn't Jiruda done that yet?

"But he didn't seem like someone who was on a mission." Jean said. "He was just some regular strong guy."

That's another thing. June was the less psychic one of the two; they both have twin telepathy, but Jean could point out things quite miraculous to the meager human eye. "But _still_ , I implore you, do _not_ take the chance when you see it." June iterated it again, seeing through her twin's thoughts. " _He's not going to be anywhere near here, so do not think you're seeing him anytime soon._ Got it?" With that, the twin didn't even wait for a reply. She just left the room, already annoyed at the fact that Jean would intercept the Kaioshin like that.

The door to June's office was shut, leaving Jean alone. The twin laid her eyes on the ground; of course Zamasu would stray away from this building _in particular_ , but who's to say that he'll be staying away from _South City_? Besides, he said a lot of things she would agree with; humans are horrible beings to the core, they cannot be trusted amongst themselves because of their inclination to jealousy, and _fear_ especially. Zamasu, she can tell, was strong. She can feel his power radiating off of him, and she knows many people who are exactly in line with his creed. Jean smiled to herself, her line of work will be completed…

If he wasn't going to come to her, then she _will_ seek him out, and she _will_ find him.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 _ **Go Pha**_ **is a play on Pho Ga, which is a Vietnamese morning soup dish btw.**

 **Regan was being mind controlled into doing the sabotage under Shigeru's orders. From the proximity of where this bomb was located to Jay's house, you can tell this was this way of trying to get at the music producer while causing collateral damage. Understand that Regan was not supposed to get caught, that this was essentially a mission where he would plant the bomb and wait until it would explode.**

 **Essentially, a** _ **suicide**_ **mission.**

 **The countdown itself wasn't meant to go off in the interrogation room, but Jiruda** _ **purposely**_ **interfered with it after he found that the plan had failed. Had Regan continued being under the** _ **spell**_ **, Mace would not have garnered more information on behalf of this** _ **organization**_ **. This lets you know that Jiruda is not playing for one side only. Almost no one will know about that other than his own fleet.**

 _ **Heh…**_

 **June's twin sister is the one who damn near molested Zamasu, it was not June herself. I'm pretty sure that much could be told with how sincerely confused she was, this won't be the last time you'll see Jean though.**

 **Anywho, see youse on the next one!**


	36. Outburst

**Posting this here, so I can go ride my meat bicycle. It is a nice day today.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Outburst**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

"You already know, I've been concerned for a while now."

"Concerned over what?"

"For you and of him, y'know." Rebecca was referring to James. "You and him have been distant for quite a while."

"That kinda stuff happens, 'Bec. You know this." Irene waved it off, she sipped on her matcha tea. "James and I are just going through times where we lay off one another. We're pretty busy people."

"But we're on vacation." Rebecca said. "He should be spending more time with you."

On Rebecca's part, the doctor was right; James has been hanging around her but not as much as they used to. This was the conversation they were having last night, but Rebecca wanted to talk with her friend again this near-afternoon about it since it greatly concerned Irene. Irene and James would be _inseparable_ back then, and now James is putting a hold on their relationship for now. Irene couldn't understand why, but she always assumed the best; mayhaps he still needs some time, since they did get into an argument some time ago.

Rebecca, _outwardly_ , assumed the worst. She'll have to do some covert work, just in case if she finds James with someone else...

"He's just been seeing his grandaunt and being around his friends. I can trust Jay and Adrian, if something is wrong, they would tell me."

Rebecca knew that. "Still." She swirled her straw in her smoothie. "Keep an eye on him."

"Why are you so vigilant for?" Irene started to laugh. "I can assure you, there is no funny business going on outside of our relationship. That's not gonna happen." Irene shrugged with a chuckle. "Don't worry so much, first for Lexi and now James? Rebecca, _relax._ "

For the past month and a half, Rebecca has been noticing Stark changes in the way Lexi is now. The model, at the core, was still herself, but now she didn't hang around Rebecca anymore. _Most_ of her phone calls were with Ambrose now, her business meetings were becoming a regular part of her routine (save for now since she was on vacation), and whenever she's actually with Rebecca she can't help but talk about the events that have happened at Rose Corp so far.

"Okay the thing with Lexi is, she doesn't even talk with Jay anymore!"

"She does." Irene leaned forward. "She's still with him, you know."

"Yeah, but they seem distant now. Like, I don't want her to get real close with Ambrose, and then end up getting cheated on."

That is a weird placement of fault there. Of the two individuals, Lexi was more likely to cheat because of her involvements, Jay himself remains a loyal man, but Rebecca was looking out for the people she cares about.

"Jay would ne _ver_ cheat, Rebecca. He's not like that."

"He just… needs to have a talk with her at least."

"It's a business venture, though. It should be expected of Lexi to get amicable with _Ambrose_ himself."

"Yeah, but not enough to not take her _mind_ off of him!" Rebecca gave Irene a cross look. "I dunno what kind of shit he's swaying her to do."

"Who?" Irene furrowed a brow. "Ambrose?"

"Yes." Rebecca nodded. "It's not unheard of for a male business partner to wrap his female counterparts around his finger whenever he can. He's rich as hell, he'll do anything to keep himself on top of someone."

It's quite surprising to hear Rebecca speaking of Ambrose, despite not knowing him at all. "I'm sure he isn't even like that. From what Lexi tells me, he's a sweet and reasonable person."

"She's enraptured." Was all Rebecca had to say. "How could she keep that much interest in someone who probably lives sheltered away from everyone else?"

Oh, there is _much_ you can garner from him. In fact, it wasn't Ambrose's fault for keeping Lexi interested, rather it was the other way around; the model subconsciously would pick the best, most attractive outfits to their meetups, she would get real close to him and she would try to push against him on her own accord. Ambrose on the other hand, would keep things under a strictly business manner, he wouldn't try to sway her in any other way.

"You're reaching again, man." Irene shook her head. "Lexi is smart. She knows how to handle herself."

"But Ambrose is _much smarter_." Rebecca narrowed her eyes. "He can manipulate anyone without even trying."

Part of her bashing came from the fact that she is now losing a friend to someone else, and she didn't like the idea of losing it to someone who was richer, geekier, and more than likely socially inept. It irritated her; what can _he_ do that she couldn't?

" _Rebecca, chill out._ " Irene held her hands up. "As I said before, Lexi knows how to handle herself. If something like that were to happen, she could just get Jay on his case."

That last part was jokeful, remarking that Jay would beat a trillionaire's ass for being sweet with Lexi was wishful thinking, not only because Jay liked Ambrose, but because Jay was at a disadvantage. If Ambrose wanted to, since he had _lawyers upon lawyers upon justice officials_ that he's affiliated with, Jay laying a hand on him he _will_ get sued. Not only that, but self defense is not a rarity, some people are stronger than others, some are weaker than others, and some of them are just hiding.

They don't know who they would be dealing with if a physical fight broke out.

Rebecca sighed. "Fine, fine. I rest my case." She chuckled lightly, her phone vibrating all of the sudden. She got a message from an unsaved number that she's been talking with; said number was temporarily stored as a private line, so it cannot be traceable by conventional means.

778-88-6783 _ **: Where? This city is weird.**_

While Irene went back to eating the rest of her food, Rebecca quickly took her phone in hand and replied.

Rebecca: _**Eastbound :)**_.

She was only giving locations to a place this person needed to be. She didn't need to say much since the names of the area they were at weren't that hard to work with.

"Other than worrying about your friends, how is this resort for you?"

Rebecca turned her phone off at that question. "Oh, it was okay. Actually, pretty fun to say the least." She looked downwards. "I kinda wanna hang around Zamasu more, I miss his company."

Irene nodded and looked downwards. "Me too."

Rebecca frowned. "You miss him?"

"Why the fuck not?" Irene shrugged, she giggled as she tucked her curly hair back. "It's fun speaking with him, and seeing how angry he gets when I breathe."

"It's vacation, I'm sure he just needs a break from you." Rebecca smirked, earning a light punch from her best friend. " I think you two are starting to get along."

" _Uh-huh_." Irene scrunched her face up in sarcasm. "That guy can't stand me being around him." Which should give her incentive to piss him off more because it's funny, but she's had a few things lingering in her mind, namely James of course. There were tiny seeds of doubt planted in her thoughts on behalf of how their relationship will be, or rather if it will last. It seems to be falling, she didn't understand why; for the most part, she gave James a lot and expected much from him because that was what she gave to him. And he is an amazing boyfriend, don't get her wrong, but he feels that she isn't considerate enough for him.

There isn't much that he has for her to consider other than him anyway. She shrugged. "Things will be fine."

Her off handed comment made Rebecca look back at her after a second contact number had hit her up. She knew Irene was still thinking about James, and she would need to reassure her friend that everything is going to go well. The redhead woman smiled kindly, her bright features were sincerely positive as she patted her best friend's shoulder with her left hand.

"Everything's going to be fine, Irene. Trust me…"

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

He dreaded this.

He dreaded _ever_ thinking that a relationship was going to make him feel valid and complete, because it sure as hell _doesn't._

Ethan, after leaving Rose Corp that evening, went to a catering place in downtown of South City. There was a reason why, though; he wasn't hungry or anything, he just didn't want to go to his house because his girlfriend _just_ confirmed to be there. He didn't want to deal with her manipulative tricks or shit like that, and this was the first time, _personally_ , that he could say he was tired of it.

He didn't know if that was an effect of working at a job that _required_ confidence, and from the great people around him.

He also packs his laptop almost everyday, he sits at any coffee shop or even during his breaks just typing away. He extensively started learning how to code and how to comprehend algorithms over the past month and then some, and he was shocked, almost _scared_ , to say that this was much easier than he had expected. In fact, it was much more fun when compared to writing articles of _any_ topic, he found himself getting deep into it. He would spend extra time after clocking out talking with Evan and Chandler about… just _coding_.

Hey, it was much better than doing nothing, which was his life prior to working here for the most part.

He ordered a platter of cookies and a cup of water, even his eating habits had changed, and went to one of the booths by the window to sit. As he walked he came across a guy sitting by himself, looking like he was waiting on something. His cup (which was covered, fortunately) was too close to the edge. He had papers right beside him with a digital notepad, and he moved his arm to rest his other hand fretfully on his forehead, but the back of his hand pushed the cup over the edge of his table.

Quickly, since Ethan was walking right next to him in lieu of the action, Ethan held the cup at its body, keeping it from falling and spilling all over the place.

The man himself looked in alarm, but realized that Ethan had caught his cup before it fully dropped. "Thank you so much."

"No problem." Ethan nodded. "Are you alright?"

The man placed the cup _away_ from the edge now, and he sighed. "Yeah, yeah I'm good and all. Just little things here and there, but I'm good nonetheless."

Ethan looked over his features. He tilted his head. "You sure? You don't look so good."

He seriously didn't know where this _newfound_ confidence came from.

The man before him wasn't mean and asocial, so he regarded Ethan with a small pause before caving in. "... You'd be right." His Mandalan features made him have an eye smile when his lips would curve upward, but he wasn't masking his concern. "Things been a little shady lately."

Ethan raised a brow. "Like, job wise?"

"More like social wise." The man moved his pen away. "My job is fine, there is just been some things going on a friend."

"Really?" Ethan raised his brows. "Are they okay? Wait- can I sit?"

"Eh, sure, go ahead." He waved his hand dismissively. "And yes, she's fine. At least I would like to think that, but she hasn't spoken to me in a while."

"Oh." Ethan blinked, a waitress came by with a dessert platter of cookies and a cup of water. He threw in a suggestion. "So she's busy?"

"She works at the same place as me."

Ethan frowned. "Haven't you tried talking to her?"

"I have." He shrugged. "She doesn't sit down to talk with me at all."

Ethan can _relate_ , heck his girlfriend did the same thing. "You know, if it makes you feel any better, I'm in the same boat too."

He took a sip out of his cup. "Really?"

"Yeah; my girlfriend is uhh…" Ethan looked away before snorting to himself. "Kind of an ass. She only cares about herself."

It was now the man's turn to furrow a brow. "Why don't you call it quits then?"

Ethan looked back at him, gesturing with a smile. "Why don't _you_ call it quits?"

The man blinked, but the both of them had a moment of silent agreement. "Now that I think about it, I really don't know. She's just been in some trouble and I was worrying about her, but she is only a friend; I'm in _less_ of a bond with her." He shrugged apologetically. "I'm sorry that you have a shit girlfriend."

"I mean-okay, I made mistakes and… was desperate."

"I can tell." The man smiled. "You look really young."

"Huh?" Ethan frowned, and looked at the Mandalan man before him. What if this guy was like seventeen? "I'm only in my early twenties."

"See? Like I said." The man chuckled. "I'm a new 40."

"You're _forty_?" Ethan leaned forward.

"Yup, just turned forty like a week ago."

"Wow…" Ethan nodded, and then he narrowed his eyes. "Lemme guess; you had a party or something, she didn't come?"

"Well actually I did go out with a few friends for pool. She was heading out for vacation at the time."

Ethan nodded in thought. "I think she's just not rolling with you, man. Seems like a subtle way to end a friendship, I assume you guys have been close for a long time."

"Three years, to be relative." He smiled. "It was nice meeting you, by the way. I'm Terry."

"Ethan." The IT admin (yes, that's his title now. He's stoked to have it) shook Terry's hand. "Nice to meet you too."

Terry gave the guy a sweet smile. "What'cha got over there?"

" _Oh_ , this is just my laptop." Ethan pulled his laptop up. "I was about to do some logging and stuff, just on the fly."

"Really?" Terry took another sip, already interested in Ethan's techy business. "Tell me more about it."

He did. What was supposed to be a solemn hour of him just coding and getting ideas out, turned into a solid hour and a half speaking with this guy Terry. They had a lot in common, in terms of the situations they were going through, and he learned that the man was a gynecologist. That's quite riveting.

When Terry had to leave, the two exchanged numbers having being relatable and amicable to one another. Ethan had bid him a farewell before opening his laptop and jotting some stuff down. He spent another forty five minutes sitting before leaving a tip and exiting the catering place to head back to his house.

He parked his car _in front_ of his house, and went up to his door with his key in hand. He entered his house to see none other than his girlfriend relaxed against his couch. She didn't say hi, and this time Ethan didn't make the effort to immediately greet her, he just went to place his things on the counter table that divided his kitchen and living room.

"So you're not gonna say hi to me?"

And _there she goes._ "Hello." Ethan took off his jacket. "How are you?"

"I'm good." She didn't look at him. "Where were you?"

"At work."

"Work shouldn't be this long."

"I did a little overtime." Ethan went into his fridge aimlessly.

"Why?" She stood up from her seat, now going towards the kitchen countertop to lean against it. "You're already making a lot of money, there's no need for you to stay there for so long."

Ethan turned to look at her. "I do a lot more than just take and note calls, you know."

"Like what?"

Ethan paused for a moment. "I kinda help with blueprints of stuff. Those take a while."

Ethan had inadvertently gotten better at wording, so now he wasn't cowering under her glare like he used to. She blinked twice, furrowed her brows and nodded slowly. "Hmm…" Then, just like that, she turned around and went back to her show on the TV. That had been happening a lot lately, and much of it stems from how much _less_ bullshit Ethan's been taking from her; once she realizes she has nothing over him, she just leaves him alone. Even sometimes when she ignores how he was and just starts rambling about her own life, she'll notice that Ethan would now ask her to stop so that he could work on something.

He used to let her ramble on, over fear. Fear that he no longer knew the reason to.

Ethan watched her plop back down on his couch, taking his remote and turning the volume up on his TV. He shrugged to himself, he was already making enough to sustain his house very well anyway.

He went to his room with his jacket and laptop. He no longer needed a brief case because Chandler said that… well, one didn't really need to bring one to Rose Corp in the first place, unless if they were specializing in critical paperwork. Ethan quickly changed into his _home gear_ , which was a pair of sweatpants and a regular shirt, then he plopped down on his bed and turned the laptop right back on. He cracked down on behalf of what he was making, it was an idea he propped up while sitting at the food court one day. Even though she had left him alone, Ethan still felt her negative vibes from here.

He wouldn't let that dower his ability to work. _Hell no_.

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

As for James, the basketball player had left the motel with his bros, and he was now in his one bar called Tatch. It was within reach of Intima, _selectively far_ from the love hotel in regards to Zamasu, and just four miles away from their actual suite location.

Every one of the guys had picked an open, curved shaped booth that allowed them to see everything within the actual bar. James went up to the bartender to get drinks, and Jay for almost the first fifteen minutes into their arrival was nearly fidgeting happily over something.

"Are you okay?"

The Kaioshin looked kind of concerned for the Mandalan producer, even if he wasn't looking like he was in trouble.

Jay looked at Zamasu and stopped bouncing in his seat, shrugging. "Oh, nothing. Nothing at all."

"Are you sure about that?"

Now Jay was smart, he quickly cleared his mind of the thoughts in his mind before Zamasu could impeach his brain, even though that's not something Zamasu was going to do. "Yup."

"He's just excited because he gets to drink fine Zamayaki again." Adrian shrugged at his best friend hitting his arm.

"You're acting like I don't drink a lot."

"You _don't_ drink a lot." Adrian clarified his statement, and Jay went silent because it was true. " _Exactly._ "

"That's a good habit on your part, Jay." Zamasu regarded the producer. "But I can tell it's something else that's making him so jumpy."

Adrian looked up from his phone and smirked, weirdly enough Zamasu can tell that this was something they both were hiding. "I know why…"

"Why?"

Adrian looked back at the automatic glass doors along with both Jay and Zamasu. Several seconds later, an individual walked in wearing a velvety dark red fitted shirt and black pants of the same velvet texture. His black shoes were as shiny as loafers, and his long hair was pulled back into a braided ponytail. Zamasu's eyes went wide, and Jay's smile got so big his cheeks could be hurting right now.

"SHONA!"

The martial artist turned immediately at the sound of his name, and smiled brightly at the group of people that he was going to fight in four days. He went to sit by Jay. "Hello all."

"Shona." Zamasu couldn't help the smile on his face. "Why show up so early?"

"Because when I found out you all were in Intima," Shona shrugged, "I couldn't help it. I like the sights of this place."

"Fair enough." Adrian dapped Shona up. "How was the production team?"

Adrian was referring to the most Shona was going to be in. Since he is a major star, he knows the actual directors and screenwriters for what project he'll be in. "They were cool for the most part, a few of them brought MegaSoakers in and we all had a gun fight after the set."

MegaSoakers are Desna's SuperSoakers. If you remember what those even were, you were an awesome child.

"The type of shit that goes on behind the scenes…" Adrian shook his head. "Why didn't you invite me?"

"Aren't you all on vacation?" Shona narrowed his eyes.

" _Right,_ but still." Adrian nudged Shona's shoulder. "Just for that, I'm not going easy on you when we fight."

"You're not going easy on me?" Shona blinked. The three humans heard a loud snort from Zamasu; this reminded him of the off handed comment Shona made back in the masseuse parlor, where he said that the men they were fighting 'looked strong'. He didn't know why he suddenly remembered that, but Shona's humbleness was almost comedic to him when it came to insults.

"Isn't Shona a reprised martial artist, Adrian?" Zamasu gestured to the older superactor. "What can you do to him?"

" _He can scratch me_." Shona said. " _But not without breaking his nail_."

Both Zamasu and Jay quirked up at that quote. Jay snapped his finger at Shona. "Don't bring _Return of the Ancient_ quotes around here, _boy-o_!"

That was a movie Shona was once in, and that was a quote from his character. He shrugged. "Just saying. Now, what about you Zamasu? You've spent thousands of years studying martial arts haven't you?"

"More than you can fathom." Zamasu nodded.

"Are you sure that's not just book knowledge?"

Oh, so now _Shona_ wants to rank with him too?He heard the sound of Jay and Adrian going _oooo_ over his rebuttal. _Alright._ "I'm more than _positive_ it isn't. You've seen what I was capable of doing."

"Not to the fullest extent." Shona smirked.

Zamasu shook his head. "Don't get too _full_ of yourself."

Meanwhile, James had been saucing up orders for everyone's drinks. They did offer green tea and James had picked that for Zamasu since he is _proper._ He decided to stay and actually wait instead of going back to his boys, surfing stuff on his phone for the time being.

There was this female bartender who keeps eyeing him in a weird way. As Shona walked in, James had turned around to greet him since Shona had seen him through the tinted glass doors. All James did was turn around, say 'hey' with a tiny wave and once he turned back around, the woman was right in front of him.

"Good evening."

She smiled sweetly, she was _very attractive_ ; her hair was very long and curly, but it cascaded like Adrian's instead of staying as an afro. Hr skin was a light coffee coir, she had gorgeous green eyes and an equally gorgeous smile. She had a finger tracing circles against the bar tabletop that she was leaning on.

"Uhhh, good evening to you."

"James Desmond, right?" She tilted her head.

People knew him, he was famous. "In the flesh."

"I have a brother who is an absolute fan of yours." She smiled. "So am I. He just got me into basketball."

"Really?" James smiled, not noticing the fact that she was leaning forward to show her cleavage. That wasn't what James was focused on.

" _Yeah,_ like… I saw the last finals and was rooting for you." She smiled. "You here on vacation?"

A plus in his book was when a fan didn't excessively talk about his career. It is kind of weird when someone keeps… congratulating you on your talent; once is fine, but after like four consecutive times it just gets awkward. "Mmhmm, with a few friends."

"Ooh, where are they?"

"Over there." James pointed with his thumb, and she did this cute action of moving forward a bit just to see them. That was cute.

They looked like they were bantering. The smile on her face grew. "You all look like a funny bunch." She giggled. "How long will you guys stay here?"

"Like uhh… two more weeks and then some."

"Really?" Her eyes widened, brightening the hue of her greens. "So am I!"

Now it was James' turn to widen his eyes. "Really?"

"Yup." When she noticed the frown on his face, she explained. "Business trip. I like to travel, and work as a bartender in places around the globe."

"Ahhh, so you're a relocator?" James said. Relocators are people that take the same occupation in different countries and cities. "That's interesting."

She nodded. "Yup, I'll get called in for something else in another two or something weeks." That 'something else' was nothing that James needed to know. "Are you single?"

James looked into her eyes. She had really beautiful eyes, and her face was pliant, but it had a fiery side to her that only the men she's with can see. She held herself up very well, it was almost surprising to catch a fan who would be this way with him. She was gorgeous, she did her job _very well_ (he can tell from the hiball she made for him), and her voice was something to die for as a female...

The basketball player shook his head. "Nah, in a relationship."

"Ooh, that's sweet." The smile on her face didn't fall. In fact, it got bigger. "How is your girlfriend?"

"She's fine, for the most part."

"For the _most_ part?"

"We haven't talked in a while." James shrugged. "She and I have been busy."

"I can tell, you probably had _many_ interviews and preshots you needed to go to after that game." The bartender shrugged. "Is she on vacation with you?"

For some reason, her attractive advances stopped, she was not engaging in getting to know him at least. Strangely enough, James was okay with it; it's not like this person herself was set out to ruin his life or anything. Most of the population doesn't give a fuck of your status unless you do something good. "She is."

"Then why not talk with her?"

"We're distancing. Getting our shit together, basically." He chuckled.

"Ahh, I get that, I get that." She nodded. "Shit happens, y'know."

"Exactly." He nodded; this woman was chill as hell. He gave her a smile and she smiled at him too, she had a really warm smile…

He noticed the drinks coming around by a server who was carrying them in a cocktail tray. She snapped her fingers at the server's direction. "I think that's yours."

James turned around to see the server place the tray of rich and aged drinks (plus the special tea) on their table. He turned back to her. "You're right." He got jump from the stool chair, giving her a nod in acknowledgement. "It was nice talking with you, umm…"

"Just call me B.A." She said.

"B.A, that's… that's quite unique." That earned a giggle from the pretty woman. "You're an interesting person." As in, her persona seemed interesting. B.A gave him a kind wave as he left her side, not as reluctantly as he would think so since his friends were here, and went to the others.

Away from where he and B.A were sat another woman who was in _tensely_ eyeing the basketball player. She, in contrast, looked like she couldn't contain herself.

"Looks like Shona and the bubs have _arriiiived!"_ James raised his hands, making the rest of his group raise their glasses and teacups.

"You are _late_ to the party." Jay shook his head.

"But _I'm here_." James sat down and took an empty glass, filling it with ice from their personal bucket and grabbing a bottle of Josu. "What did I miss?"

"These three were bantering again." Adrian said.

" _You_ were in it too!" Jay pointed a finger at his bestie.

"Is it about the fight?" James narrowed his eyes. "You guys can't stop going on about that. Is that why Shona's here early?"

"Well, I love Intima. I used to come here a lot." Shona smiled. "I can't help the sights."

" _Right."_

"I'm serious!" Shona reasoned quickly. "But I wouldn't lie; a good combat is always something to reprise."

"You'd be right on that." Zamasu agreed, before something caught his eye. A woman he didn't know was walking to them with an elegant platter of treats for the five men. She _seriously_ reminded him of Irene, except much more attractive, she even caught his eye.

B.A smiled kindly at the men, even though she was sort of confused as to why _the green guy_ is here. She placed the platter down. "Your treats, gentleman."

James raised a glass in her ode. "Thank you very much, B." B.A gave him a quirky smile, an inviting one, before turning around to her bartending duties. Zamasu watched her catlike gait, that woman was _fine_. He looked down at the treats, which were jelly-like and shaped in cute little cubes.

"Guys look!" Adrian pointed to the mounted TV on a farther wall, placed in a position where almost everyone could see it in this portion of the bar. There was a game of contact dodgeball being played and _boy_ , when Zamasu first saw this he was friggin' _hooked_. It was basically what we once knew as standard dodgeball, except the players themselves were very good at acrobatics and would do flips, bullet jumps, screws and cartwheels to dodge the incoming balls from the other team. The entire playfield had this insane layout with obstacles around as if this was freeform tag too, and trust me when you sit to watch this, it gets _intense_.

Back when he used to live with Rebecca, he went _hours_ watching reruns of this stuff.

"Who's on who?" Jay leaned to the side to see the screen better. "Is it the Fangs against the Fists?"

Yes, they have _teams_ too. Adrian nodded. " _Yuuuup_ , this was the one battle that aired like a month ago."

"It still stands as the _best_ episode of the season." James nodded. "Team Fang."

" _Excuse you?_ " Jay stole Zamasu's favorite line. "Team _Fist_."

" _Fang_." Adrian frowned at Jay.

"Sorry Adrian, I'm on one with the Fists." Shona shrugged and smirked. The four males looked at the God, who watched them go at it before shrugging his shoulders.

"I am impartial." Zamasu smirked.

"Oh, you think you're smug." Adrian narrowed his eyes.

"It's not right for a _god_ to choose sides."

"Okay so, let's say you found out Irene was also impartial. Are you still gonna _not_ choose sides?"

Zamasu furrowed a brow. "Why would that affect me?"

"Because Irene." That earned a snort from Jay and a chuckle from James, while Shona remained confused.

"What is wrong with Irene?"

"He doesn't like her." James answered Shona's question.

"Why?"

"I have barely any tolerance for stupidity." Zamasu shook his head. "Let's watch this for now, I think the match is almost over."

He had just noticed and realized two things; James no longer defend his girlfriend when Zamasu says something about her, of course that could just be him accepting the annoyance Zamasu has for her. But that fact was supplemented by another; Jay no longer talks much with Irene.

He barely keeps contact with her, at least as outwardly as he used to. Zamasu wondered if something happened between the two, or if there was more that Irene said in that one phone argument and Jay now knows about it. They may be two very meager observations, but it surely piqued a brow from him.

" _Yooo_ , D is in, D is in!" Adrian pointed to the supposed D, who just jumped right in to the area ready for action. Pretty much everybody was locked in on the actual game; the guys themselves were leaning in, and James was damn near standing off of his seat.

The Kaioshin kept his eyes on the screen, there was only D versus Nu, the other team member from the Fangs. B.A was sitting on the countertop watching the scene with her coworkers as well. They watched as both D and Nu went into the opening each carrying two balls. They were now throwing and dodging at superfluous speeds, flipping and jumping just in time to snatch the ground from the ground.

There were sounds of people perpetually waiting for the winner to arise. At one point, the ball came at a close-shot with D, and he could not side step quick enough. He put all his leg power into a beautifully executed backflip while the ball went flying right beneath him, and he threw the ball in his hand, knocking Nu right out and leaving his team as the victor of the match.

That made an uproar go off in the bar as everyone _who was for the Fists_ cheered on, James had jumped right out of his seat already hyped up by the fact that his team had won. Many of the people actually did this too, with Jay hanging back because the Fists did lose but he wasn't mad at all.

"You saw that _backflip_ , man?" Adrian raised his hands. "It was fucking crazy!"

"It was _clean_ too." Shona nodded. "The ball didn't even graze him or anything. It was perfect."

"You know what, you guys can _enjoy_ your victory." Jay slow clapped sarcastically. Zamasu approached them too. "But the Fists are coming _right the fuck back_ next season."

" _Sure_." Adrian placed his hands on his hips. "Alright now, James-"

Adrian _turned the fuck around_ , expecting to see James all happy and elated over the Fangs' win. He did not expect to see some random woman, who had grabbed him by the collar with his hands against her waist, and her lips locked onto his.

Adrian fast walked straight to where James was while Zamasu, Shona and Jay turned around to see why Adrian was shocked. Whistles were heard everywhere, there was a flash that came from some other direction, and before James could rightfully pull away Adrian had yanked him by the back of his shirt away from the woman.

He pulled James to turn him around, the man looked mildly confused. "What the _fuck's_ that for?"

"Dude, I _swear_ on everything…" James quickly apprehended. "I was cheering and shit, and then that woman just pulled me into a kiss!"

"Did you guys see that flash?" Jay said. "Someone took a picture of that."

"Oh _shit, shit, shit, shi-_ " James looked down, panicked. It _wasn't_ on purpose, he didn't want to kiss her at all. She just yanked him into it!

Adrian can see that James did not actually want to kiss that woman, especially from how anxious he looks right now. "Okay okay, look- dude, calm down." He raised his hands.

Jay came in to reassure him. "It was an accident man. Where is that b-"

"Language, please. I know you're angry." Shona caught Jay before he could say something incriminating.

"Where is that _woman_?" Jay looked around and Zamasu scanned the area.

"She had ran once James was pulled from her." The Kaioshin frowned. "She may have even left this bar."

"Oh, for fuck's-" James breathed. "You guys gotta listen, that was _completely_ unintentional."

"We can _tell_." Zamasu nodded. "Calm down, I'm sure that picture wasn't taken directly at you two. Keep in mind, everybody is in the midst of celebrating right now."

"Exactly." Shona agreed. "You're fine. It was just an accident, James."

It didn't sit right with him. Sure, fans are crazy but he's kept himself fortified enough for this to never happen. The _one_ time he decides to go out without heavy security, and _this_ happens?! This woman had left the entire bar afterwards too, _none_ of this sat right with him. But he had to stick with the positive notes of this; to be fair, this wouldn't incriminate him in any way especially considering where they were at, and what had just occurred.

"Fine, fine. It was." James finally caved in. "Can we leave?"

"Fine." Jay nodded, not giving it a second thought. "We'll leave."

"I'll tip." James pulled out his wallet, and went to their table to leave a fat sum on their bill plus a hefty tip. Zamasu watched the quickness of this man; all of the sudden, he sees James worrying over being seen as a cheater by Irene. He knew that James was nowhere near that, the man had much to consider, but seeing him like this in this incident was thought provoking.

Because like James, Zamasu himself did not think this sat right with him at all.

"Alright." James picked his jacket up while the others did as well, minus Zamasu since the cold didn't affect him. The basketball player took a deep breath before turning to the other wary men. "Let's hit up another place."

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

Irene was chatting on the phone with Ashley, who was out with Lexi shopping for some clothes. The artist lounged back against a sofa with a bowl of chips in her lap, looking at the TV in front of her.

"So how are the guys, since Adri called you earlier?"

"Oh they're doing fine." Ashley smiled. "They're at this bar called Tatch-"

"They're at a _bar?_ " Irene's eyes went wide. "-Sorry, I just haven't been to one in a really long time."

"You didn't know about Tatch?" Ashley shrugged. "It's like the most _well known_ bar out here. I dunno if they are still there, though."

"When did Adrian call you?"

"Like two hours ago. They were in Tatch at the time but knowing _them_ , they probably went elsewhere."

"Hnn." Irene nodded slowly. "That's gonna be my next catch. Alright, I'll see you later, hope you pick out something Adrian will like."

Irene could _see_ Ashley's wink. The writer smiled. "Trust me, I got Lexi right next to me. I _will_." She giggled. "Alright, catch you later."

Irene hung up, smiling down at her phone. Ashley and Adrian were a cute couple, they were a _loyal_ couple too; nothing could ever get in the way of their bond. She decided to at least check the website of this Tatch place. Luckily enough, Intima's search engine also had optimized image viewers, where those who search for a place will get recent pictures of said place from those who posted publicly. She typed in 'Tatch', which brought up the actual website and some of the pictures that were recently taken. The interior of the place looked very modern and smooth, many of the decorations and furniture had light around their outlines. There were pictures of people chilling around, the statue on the front of the bar's logo…

This place was quite nice.

Rebecca, out of nowhere, came nearly running down the hallway. Since the hallway was carpeted, her footsteps weren't loud at all. She paused, apprehensive, then slow walked her way to stand just several feet behind her best friend to see what she was looking at. She came at _just_ the right time: Irene was looking at the sights images.

"Hey!" Rebecca came around the sofa and sat right by her friend. She placed an arm over her shoulder. "How ya been?"

"I'm good, I'm just checking out this one place Ashley told me about." Irene shrugged. "Tatch."

"Oh really?"

"Yup, that's where Adrian and the guys are, or were at today." Irene scrolled through the pictures.

"I'm sure they left by now, they've been away from this suite for a few hours." Rebecca leaned forward to peep the phone screen.

Irene was busy looking at the sceneries, so her voice started to trail. "I'm sure too… I wonder if I can find some recent pictures too. These pics were taken like two years ago of how the place looked, it might have changed by then."

When she reloaded the page, Rebecca went into the kitchen to get a random drink. A notification for new feeds popped up. When she did, there were like four new photos; one of the actual page, which only looked marginally different, and two of the others that showcased the bar's large selection of the best drinks.

One in particular caught the absolute, most _perfect_ snapshot of James. This picture was not him jumping all happy like he was _prior_ because she couldn't see his face.

Because some woman was kissing him.

Irene looked normal for the first _two seconds_ of looking at the photo, almost not registering it as _anything_ before it started to sink in. Slowly, her face morphed into one of a multitude of emotions; shock, confusion, irritation, and _anger_. This was a perfect still shot, as if it was taken from a movie, and the entire atmosphere looked like some giant party. She can sort of point of a sliver of Adrian's curly hair at the edge of the image itself, but _this_ …

James had kissed another _woman_.

Irene instantly _dropped_ her phone on the coffee table, and leaned back with her fingers on her temples. James told her that they were to separate, since they were having complications in their relationship but… is this what he meant? Maybe that's why he wanted to distance away from her.

 _What, is he too pussy to say that he doesn't want to be with me anymore?!_

"So, I came across this thing right?" Rebecca was leaning by the kitchen's open exit. "And… Irene, are you okay?"

"Come here."

All Irene said was that, and she was _serious_. Rebecca cocked her neck back and blinked, tilting her head. "What's wrong?"

" _That's_ what the fuck is wrong." Irene pointed at her phone. " _Look_ at it."

Rebecca came closer to see the image of James kissing another woman.

Irene couldn't see her friend's face. "No way…" Rebecca sounded incredulous, _how was this taken?!_

" _Ye_ s way." Irene stood up. "He's been talking about 'Oh, we should distance for a bit to get ourselves together' and 'We'll surely be better by the' and then he goes out, and does _shit_ like this?!" Irene pointed at her phone angrily. She was talking as if he's done this before, and in truth he hasn't, but once you've been cheated on…

You can't help but think they may have done this more than a hundred times.

Rebecca, knowing her friend group more than anyone, nodded. She had present evidence to support her grave suspicions, even though Irene wouldn't want this to _ever_ happen to her. "Irene… this is rash-"

"No shit!" She started pacing. Rebecca knew Irene very well; Irene was one of those people who had never had bad intentions, nor had she ever had bad things done to her. She lived life in an inadvertently protected seal, so she can't handle when something goes wrong.

Rebecca took a step forward. "I could have expected this from him, but not in _this_ manner." She shook her head. "I don't like this."

Irene took a moment to breathe. "Rebecca, you know how he's famous and shit don't you?" In the heat of her anger, Irene started to adopt the thoughts and concepts Rebecca had voiced to her before. Rebecca widened her eyes. "So he thinks he can just go off and kiss another woman and not get caught?!"

"Irene, calm down-"

Her friend grabbed her phone, saved a screenshot, and then pressed the home button and turned it off. "Just wait, _wait until he comes back._ "

Rebecca looked downwards, keeping the scornful look on her face. "I just can't believe it, that that actually even happened…"

Despite once being in an abusive relationship, Rebecca herself has never been cheated on. She didn't have much moral support to directly give in this case, because that image only showed a direct breach of trust. "I can't believe it, that this was captured."

Irene sat back down, the fire in her was during. Her hands were shaking with the need to blow some steam off, and who better to do it at then the person who fucked you over? She propped her hand against her cheek. "I'm gonna _fuck_ his world up the minutes he steps in this fucking suite…"

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

"That was a _fucking cheat!"_ Adrian narrowed his eyes. "That whole damn game was a cheat!"

"What, because you can't match a _god_ in accuracy, Adrian?" Zamasu smugly gestured to himself.

"Was this his first time bowling too?" Shona asked. Apparently, Shona himself never went bowling until now.

"...yes." Jay answered.

"You know what's really sad?" James started to laugh. "You two," He referred to Adrian and Jay, "got your asses handed to you by two dudes who have _never_ played before."

"I'm not a _dude_." Zamasu retorted.

"Okay, then what are you?"

"I'm a _god."_

"You're a dude, still. Or like a dude-god." James shrugged. Shona facepalmed and kept his gaze on the limo's window.

Zamasu straight faced. "I'll pretend you never said that."

"I'm telling Ashley that you beat the both us." Adrian looked at Zamasu. " _Nobody_ can best Ashley in bowling."

"Excuse you?" Zamasu cocked his neck back. "If I can beat the both of you, what makes you think I can't go against Ashley?"

"She's _the_ best by a mile." Adrian said. "Was of the Top 5 in West City, and in the leading top 10s in all of Tycho."

"No ranking system could out match the mastery of _me_ , Adrian." Zamasu snapped his fingers. "Keep that in mind."

"Fine, we're going back to the suite anyway." Adrian said. "Maybe next time, I'll get _you_ to challenge her."

" _Hmmph_." Zamasu crossed his arms. They had reached the suite in around fifteen minutes, the guys getting off and _each_ leaving a tip for the limo driver before walking off to their suite's entrance.

Let's just say the limo driver was _happier than normal_ after that tip.

Adrian offered to open the door, and told Shona that there was an extra room if he planned on staying with them. The martial artist told him that he had already rented out a room for himself, so he was fine on that behalf. They walked in and were greeted respectively by their girlfriends and Rebecca, who stayed far away from coming anywhere near James. Irene was upstairs, so she didn't come down until a minute later. Lexi gave Jay a sweet kiss after turning her phone off, and Ashley whispered something in Adrian's ear.

One thing remained clear; the majority of the girls, save for Ashley, did not openly greet James the way they did with Zamasu and notably Shona. They just gave him simple hi's, and Ashley had a look as if there was something to discuss.

Zamasu frowned, and Shona raised a brow; they were the only three who noticed this action quickly. The atmosphere of the room had changed once James entered, and _James_ in particular was trying to ignore that feeling in his gut that was telling him…

 _This isn't good._

Irene walked down the hallway the would lead to the stairs, throwing something back into the hallway nonchalantly as she did so. She waved at the guys, pissed Zamasu off _especially_ by calling him 'Sour Green', and smiled as she did so.

The second Irene saw him, she approached him quickly with a nonchalant look about her. When she got up to him, James had his arms out to embrace her. She didn't raise her hands to return the gesture; instead, she reeled back and slapped him _square_ in the face.

"So who the _fuck_ is she, huh!?" She didn't relent, she started swinging right onto him, being as belligerent as she possibly can by throwing the _worst_ of insults at him.

"Whoa, what the f-" Adrian left his girl and went to pull James away, while Zamasu instantly got pissed at sudden rampage Irene was making. Now, everyone was trying to pull the two away, Zamasu hooked his arm around Irene's mid section and lifted, literally throwing her off of him and making her fly back a several feet.

The guys, Lexi and Ashley went to go see if James was okay, because Irene's sudden _jab_ literally made him fall over. Rebecca went to go care for her friend while yelling at Zamasu. "What the _fuck_ was that for?!"

"I'd rather not have a _fight_ break out in the midst of our vacation."

"Oh, so _you're_ in on it too?!" Irene quickly sat up. "You're defending the fucking cheater?!"

The guys got quiet for like two seconds. Jay spoke before Zamasu could. "Listen, Irene, he can explai-"

"I saw the damn picture already! There is _nothing_ to explain!" She started going after him again. Zamasu gripped her arm as she passed by him. In her rash defense, she started trying to hit Zamasu even though he was dodging her only two blows before he pushed her back. He was _being nice._

She _scowled_ at him. "You're a fucking dick, you know that?"

"I'm a _what?!_ " The second Zamasu raised his voice the entire room, including Adrian and Shona helping James with his jaw, went dead silent. "You think acting rashly like this is reasonable? Watch your tone-"

" _Fuck_ your reasonability!" Irene balled her fists. "James kissed another woman and you all were there, and now you _idiots_ want to defend him?"

Where did she get the notion that Adrian and Jay, her most trusted guy friends, who turn around on her if something like this were to happen on _purpose_? She would've questioned what had happened instead of just outright fighting someone she obviously can't win against. That was the most rational thing to do in this case, especially because they were witnesses. This made both Adrian and Jay exchange looks.

"Irene." Shona was shocked to see how rabid she was, since this was his first time actually having met her. "Please understand that you have more than _three_ accounts of testimony for this situation; we all know that it wasn't something he had done on purpose."

" _Suuuure_." Irene rolled her eyes while saying that. "All of you, shut the fuck up." She waved her hands dismissively at _every_ person in the room. "Let _him_ say it was an 'accident' to my face! I wanna hear it from _him."_

Adrian shifted a little to let James look at his girlfriend. The right side of his face was reddened, and Adrian patted his shoulder. "Speak for yourself, man."

"Don't go _supporting_ him, Adrian!" Irene yelled. "You're in the wrong about this too, you fucking si-"

" _Shut the hell up and let your boyfriend speak._ "

Everyone turned to see Ashley, who looked more than peeved off at the fact that Irene was coming at everyone else _in lieu_ of being upset, not to mention she was about to insult _her_ man too. The writer turned to James. "Go ahead."

James stood up. "Listen, Irene, I swear on my _grandaunt's whitebed_ that I did not kiss that woman on purpose." He explained to her how he and the other men were watching Contact Dodgeball and were celebrating the final episode of the season. While he was up, some woman had grabbed him and slammed her lips onto his.

Zamasu winced a little. Swearing on his grandaunt's whitebed, her hospital bed, was _heavy._ But that goes to show how serious he is about keeping this relationship under wraps; even as they were heading home, James still looked anxious.

Irene blinked like three times, before frowning deeply. "You expect me to believe that shit?!" She then waved her finger at his person. "With how tall and big you are, you really think I'll believe some woman could pull you in for a damned kiss! What, was she just as tall and as strong as you?!"

"Irene-"

"Was she _prettier?!_ " She started walking towards James again, her fists were balled so that made _both_ Adrian and Jay stand on guard. "Is this what you meant by _taking time off_ of our relationship?"

" _No_ , it isn't!" James stressed. "It was all an accident, I didn't initiate anything!"

"Irene." Jay, like Zamasu, was getting annoyed at the loudness of Irene's voice. This was a side of her they all _never expected_ to see. "We were there, we _saw_ ; it wasn't James' doing."

"So?" Irene shrugged. "James could have went somewhere, chatted this bitch up without you knowing, and then have her come around to kiss him!"

Jay _literally_ pinched the bridge of his nose. "Do you _really_ think James is like that? Come on, you are his girlfriend, you should know that he tries his absolute _best_ to keep shit between the two of you peachy."

"Fuck outta here, I feel like I don't know him anymore." Irene shook her head. "I saw the picture, why would it be posted on Tatch's image feed then?!"

 _That_ was how she knew of the kiss. Now Jay was standing up fully and approaching her. "You're going by some more-than-likely shitty picture that isn't even posted _by him_ to verify his as a cheater?!" Lexi _visibly_ flinched, she knew Jay didn't like irrational people, this was how heated he could get when crossing one of them. "You have _us four_ ; me, Adrian, Zamasu, Shona- we all know James didn't kiss that woman on purpose!" Then he turned to Shona. "I'm sorry for this, man."

Irene had it, she snapped again at the t _raitorousness_ of her guy friends and while Jay was turned around, she made an attempt to swing at him again. She didn't even get a chance to connect her fist with his face, Jay had caught her forearm with two fingers.

He pushed it away with such force that Irene stumbled backwards a few meters. "Did you _really_ just try to hit me?"

"Listen, cretin," Zamasu also had _enough_ of watching this woman berate her friends, "listen to us, instead of acting like a _fool_. What happened with James was not his doing at _all_ , like we've said multiple times, we _witnessed_ this." The Kaioshin approached and stood right beside Jay. "If you attempt to hit anyone else in this room, I will _not_ hesitate in knocking you _out_ , you understand?"

Irene gave him the _darkest_ look he's ever seen on her face, but all he did was roll his eyes. She can't do shit to him. The Kaioshin regarded James. "James, go freshen up and sleep, it's been a long night. Forget about her for now, when she's open for reason and understanding, maybe then what you say will go through her thick skull."

Irene felt _utterly_ insulted at the fact that Zamasu just sweeped her away like she was _nothing_. James was about to leave, but Irene quickly stood up. "You're gonna listen to him?"

"Irene look," James once again, was trying to be sympathetic, but Zamasu could see even _his_ patience was wearing thin, "I've tried telling you that this was completely accidental. You don't trust in me?"

"I don't trust cheaters."

He cocked his neck in slight shock, she was not swayed at all. "I put it on my grandaunt's whitebed, I _swear_ on it!"

"Your grandaunt's dying soon anyway, you can't swear on that."

What Irene said concluded what Zamasu had thought of her, that she had been so 'invincible' for so long and if anything bad were to happen to her, she would not be able to handle it. What she said made Adrian frown deeply, and it _especially_ made Ashley and Jay very fucking mad. The both of them could vouch for James constantly checking on his loved one on his _own behalf_ , it was not a chore that he had to do. He selflessly went out of his way to see how his lonely grandaunt is doing. What she said made Lexi cock her neck back with a look of awe, and made Shona tilted his head in disappointment.

James didn't even argue with her anymore. Her rebuttal got him in a bad place, and the last thing he wanted was to curse her the fuck out, because… because that _hurt_. His grandaunt was one of the happiest people who got shunned by the rest of the family for her lifestyle, she may be pale and old now, but she had a smile that could brighten a cloudy day. His grandaunt was technically his second mom, his _friend_ , someone who he told many of his funny, shitpostlike stories to.

Irene had just implied that her life, in her condition now since he _knows_ she'll live, didn't mean shit to place trust on. It was a direct spit in the face to her as a senior individual.

He took hold of his jacket which was one the floor, and walked away.

He left the living room and went upstairs to his own room, leaving the angry, stubborn artist surrounded by her now shocked, and definitely _appalled_ , friends. Except for Rebecca, she went to stand by Irene's side once her friend had stopped being so rabid.

Zamasu took a deep breath, noting the twitching of Jay's eye. "Do not waste your time." Was all he said. "She's angry, she doesn't know what she's saying."

Irene snapped at Zamasu. "I know _exactly_ what I'm sa-"

"That is not something that you would _say_. Clearly, you _don't_ know." Ashley turned to he boyfriend, motioning for him to go upstairs.

The producer looked at his friend, who… pretty much wasn't afraid of hitting a woman to be honest. "Jay, leave it be. It'll sort itself out."

Jay turned to Adrian. That was Adrian's way of saying _leave her the fuck alone, it's not worth your time._ He gestured to Lexi and left the living room with her, _already_ peeved off. Adrian turned to Shona. "Hey man, uhh…" He accidentally started laughing because poor Shona was just _standing_ there all confused and clueless as to what he should even do.

"Yes?" The martial artist blinked.

"You wanna watch a movie with me and Ashley in the lobby, at least?"

Zamasu for some reason _admired_ when Adrian was passive aggressive. Shona shrugged, and then nodded. "Yeah, why not…"

"Is there room for one more?" Zamasu looked at Adrian, who straight faced at him.

" _Of course_ there's room from one more! Get the heck over there with us!" Bringing the humor back, Adrian smiled at Zamasu who smiled as well. The Kaioshin turned around without even sparing a glance at either Rebecca or Irene, he's had enough tea about the two. Adrian, Shona and Ashley left with the God, while Rebecca stood there _watching_ them all leave. Shona was the last to exit, he did give them a tiny look back and Rebecca waved her hand allowing him to go.

He had no business in this game.

"Irene, it's fine." Rebecca patted her shoulder. "Just stay away from him, I don't think I can trust him myself at all. Let them continue to follow, I got your back hun."

Irene smiled at her best friend. "Rebecca… thanks, I still can't believe that even happened."

"What, them walking away?"

" _Yes._ Even Ashley and Lexi." She shook her head and stood up to walk away. "I need a breather, lemme go get like… a drink or something and sit down."

"To think about him?" Rebecca made her disgust obvious with that question. It swayed Irene to make a negative decision.

" _Hell_ no, I'll sit down and think about the next thingy I'm gonna paint." Her waved her waved dismissively as she entered the kitchen. "Fuck him."

Rebecca chuckled a bit. "...Can I say 'that's the spirit'?"

She was being choosy with her words, but Irene came around with an enthusiastic smile. " _No,_ it is the spirit! Just move right on, girl."

Rebecca really liked Irene's enthusiasm. "You're right… move on…" Some thing that she herself had a problem with doing because it was so hard…

To change and be a better person.

Rebecca followed Irene's movements while she spoke, preferably in present tense. "You're a good person, Irene."

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Oh no, James and Irene are no longer in that perfect, peachy relationship anymore, even though they technically haven't been ever since James' big win at the grand event. Whose side are you on, if you're even choosing sides?**

 **Shona had the worst outta everyone else, he had** _ **no idea**_ **of how Irene is like in the first place.**

 **In Tycho, Ethan had** _ **just**_ **met Terry, show tells him that his friend has been ignoring him. For now, Ethan does not know the gravity of the situation, but it's been dying down unbeknownst to the gynecologist.** _ **On the plus**_ **side, he's got a new friend!** **A better one.**

 **On a point of Irene: Zamasu was** _ **right**_ **. That's all I have to say, now that she's shown a new side to her persona, how will she be treated now? Will Zamasu even** _ **try**_ **to bicker with her like he always does?**

 **We all know he will, that's bound to happen no matter what.**

 **Anyways, I'll hope to see you people in the next chapter :)**


	37. Counter-Attacks

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 **Counter-Attacks**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Over the course of the last four days, everyone mostly remained to themselves. There wasn't much speaking on behalf of the big argument that James and Irene had, and she hasn't said a word to him yet. Two days ago, James tried to bridge things between the two and Irene ended up insulting him again.

He just gave up, and decided to let things water down themselves. If she doesn't trust him telling the truth, what _can_ he do then?

Pretty much every single one of the guys had distanced themselves from Irene, especially Jay. If it hadn't been made apparent enough, he hasn't spoken with her a lot ever since four months ago. Now, Zamasu was sure the producer was pissed at how inconsiderate she could end up being, but Jay also knew that she was just angry and needed time to think. Adrian hasn't spoken with her either, which was surprising since the two are like peas in a pod, but he was fine for the most part. Rebecca had mean mugged every single one of the guys (except for Shona when he arrived today), and Lexi and Ashley were both mainly impartial. Everyone was pretty much okay with what had went down, it was the past and it had happened, so they weren't paying attention to that.

What everyone _was_ paying attention to, and by everyone I mean the strongest of the bunch, was the fact that four days had passed ever since that night. And you know what happens today right?

That's right, they're _sparring_ today.

"Okay boys and woman," Adrian cracked his knuckles, "How's everybody feeling today?"

The fighting platform was a few miles away from everything else. There was a small building in which people can go in and prepare themselves, and this building had an elevator that would take spectators to a higher room to see better. Lexi was sitting down, she was tying her lightweight shoes. "I'm good actually."

"Never been better." Jay was jumping, feeling the weight of his body against the balls of his heels.

"I'm excited." Shona was the funniest out of the four, he looked like an eager child to be sparring with his fellow friends, _especially_ Zamasu. He wanted to see what the God could do.

The Kaioshin in question didn't need to prepare himself, he just watched as everyone got ready to _lose_. "I'm great."

Adrian snickered at everyone. "Not for long…"

"You're gonna banter, and then end up getting your ass kicked." Jay narrowed his eyes. "You _know_ you're not stronger than me and Shona."

"So?" Adrian shrugged. "Leave that for the battlefield, my friend."

Lexi giggled. "I'm ready." She stood up and crossed her arms. "You guys ready?"

" _Yup_." Jay nodded, and followed the model out of the room. As they walked out and onto the platform, Shona looked at Zamasu, and Zamasu looked at Shona…

They _both_ narrowed eyes at each other, a silent pact went between the both of them.

"Alright!" Lexi snapped her fingers once she and the guys reached the center of the platform. "Here are the rules: No killing…"

"Damn it." Adrian sarcastically shook his head, which earned a dunce from Lexi on his temple.

"No horrid injuries, you can't leave the platform, you can fly and teleport, and no _telekinesis._ " Lexi emphasized the last word while looking dead at Zamasu. "Got that?"

The Kaioshin shrugged. "I don't need telekinesis to beat any of you."

" _Okay_." Lexi nodded with a look on her bare face. Dammit, he has to fight her and she looks so pretty natural faced… _No_. "I'll blow this whistle, and that's when we'll start."

The guys nodded simultaneously. "Right." Lexi raised the whistle to her mouth, Zamasu watched how _calm_ everyone looked for the most part. There was no ki flaring or nothing, he was even surprised to see how composed they were when they were seconds away from sparring. "Three… Two…"

The _very second_ she blew the whistle, _everyone_ had completely disappeared from standing near Zamasu. The Kaioshin could see them teleporting into multiple places, utterly _shocked_ that this ability was not only granted to the gods. They were _really_ going all out. He zoomed forward with no hesitation.

Jay caught Adrian's wrist before he can punch him and sent him flying back several dozen feet. Adrian quickly backflipped in midair to launch himself back at Jay. "Remember when you show me how to fly?"

Jay raised a palm to Adrian's elbow. "You can't fly very well."

A punch was sent to Jay's face. "But I can _punch_ very well."

"Why, you son of a-" Jay proceeded to take the incoming hand of Adrian's and swiftly flipped him to the floor. Adrian rolled away from Jay's strong foot, it slammed into the platform creating a small crater from the rapid force he'd built up. Adrian flipped himself up, and Jay launched at him again sending a barrage of punches and kicks alike to his friend who was struggling to keep up with his fast pace.

Adrian saw through the adamant attacks, albeit _barely_ , and moved quickly to strike a hit on Jay's chest. The Mandalan martial artist backflipped from the balls of his index fingers to keep himself from falling. " _Nice_ one."

Being a humble asshole, Adrian shrugged with a breathy smile. "Eh, don't mention it."

Shona _zipped_ past the space between the two, making Jay and Adrian's hair whip in his general direction. The superactor made a clean U-turn at the balls of his heels dodging a purposely weak ki blast from Zamasu. He swerved and looked up to see the Kaioshin calmly standing there with his hand raised at him.

Shona smiled. "That wasn't really strong." He stood up, he already felt the ki signature of that blast. It wasn't even enough to knock someone like _him_ down. "Please do not whittle down your attacks, Zamasu."

"It would be _unfair_ if I didn't." Zamasu smirked, lowering his hand and without warning, he zoomed up to where Shona was standing and raised an open palm to hit his chest at a speed most humans wouldn't catch.

 _Most humans_ , because Shona himself had blocked it with his palm as well.

"Impressive." Zamasu smiled. "You have attuned senses."

"Of course I do." Shona tilted his head, and went to jab Zamasu but the Kaioshin had blocked him. "I wasn't born in the mountains for nothing."

Zamasu smiled, the two had went off to an air fight, flying about fifty feet in the air and throwing punches and kicks at one another while circling around one another's bodies. To any bystander, it would look like the two were spinning in the air rapidly. Shona blocked a heavy punch from Zamasu with his forearm, feeling the wind of that punch pass his body as it was enough to make the _grass_ below them rustle violently. Shona smirked and returned an elbow jab _just_ as powerful as that punch, making Zamasu raise a hand and feeling his own hair move from its force. The Kaioshin saw a slight orange glint in that jab alone.

 _Okay no, he actually is strong_ … Zamasu's thoughts went by quickly, he kicked Shona far away from him and flew after him. The superactor went back about fifty feet before he flipped backwards and jetted himself at the Kaioshin. Their hits connected _almost_ simultaneously with little leeway for either one of them to get hit, up until both their punches missed by _hairslength_ and made them both zoom in separate directions. Zamasu turned, Shona turned, and the Kaioshin's fist made contact with Shona's flaring foot.

The ground below them grew windy and turbulent, the trio on the platform's surface looked up momentarily to see the great martial artist and the great Kaioshin go at it, powerful hits were causing the atmosphere around them to unsettle. Lexi went wide eyed. "They _both_ are almost even matched."

It was a spectacle to watch, especially for Jay. He's known Shona for a while, he knew what this man was capable of. It was riveting to see his friend prove himself like this, especially because he is regarded as one of the _best_ martial arts to of their time. He was leagues ahead of nearly every other human on Desna.

"It's almost impossible to tell who's ahead of who." Adrian took this moment to marvel at the two, and turned to Jay and his girlfriend to snap his fingers. " _We gotta fight too_ , kiddos!"

Lexi looked at him. "You're right." She raised her hand and then swing it back down to create a small blast, about as small as a firecracker would be, to make her boyfriend and Adrian bounce back. The two males looked over, realizing she too had jumped back to get at Adrian now. He quickly caught her foot before it hit him, and she side spun to kick him with her other foot. Adrian stumbled back, but looked at both Jay and Lexi.

"What, you both are gonna tag team me now?"

Lexi blinked, and looked to her boyfriend. "Nope." She tried to backhand Jay but he held her _hand_ with _two_ fingers, gripped it and flipped her over.

"You really think you can get me with that _simple ass_ tactic?" Jay shook her head. "Step it up, baby."

Lexi sneered, ejecting a blast at him with Adrian _jumping right_ over her person to dropkick her boyfriend. His attempt went short handed, but he still managed to lock Jay into a neckhold, turning him over and onto the ground. Jay hit the ground and kicked up at Adrian while swinging himself back up.

Adrian felt something roughly hit his back, making him stumble forwards several feet. It was Lexi's ki blast. "Really now?"

"Yup." She smiled. The three of them looked between one another, a three person free-for-all in a fight doesn't sound very fair…

They felt a huge whoosh of air several feet above them. Shona quickly grounded himself after flying above the three humans, a tiny trail dug into the platform's surface from Shona's feet. The martial artist smiled. "Is this part of the extent of your power, Zamasu?"

"Only _partly_." Zamasu descended slowly, looking at the lower humans in front of him.

Jay looked over to Shona. "You're just gonna go after him, and not even throw hands with me?" He crouched, and zoomed at Shona. "I'm offended!"

"I second that!" Adrian did the same as well. Now the two music producers were going at it with Shona, and the martial artist was handling them _exceptionally_ well. The wind picked up from everyone's quick bursts of energy, _especially_ his and Shona's, but right now there was someone else who had stepped up to him.

"Oh, _Zamasuuuu…_ "

 _No, no,_ he was _not_ going to get distracted by the beautiful coo of the model's voice. Lexi had stepped up to him and got into a quick stance with a smile on her face. "C'mon, don't be shy to hit me, sonny."

"I'm much older than you." He narrowed his eyes. "Do not call me 'sonny'."

She giggled, it sounded funny hearing him say that with his proper voice. Her smile was cute, and again, she wasn't wearing any makeup so she was bare faced, and that was when she was at her _cutest_.

God damn it.

He didn't need to go full power on her, because if he did then she would be dead. And he didn't want her to die because she's pretty.

Did he really just reason with himself like that?

Lexi started hitting him quickly, he was surprised that she was as fast as she was. Not that it was _difficult_ , but unexpected. He only needed to hold up two fingers to block and dodge her tiny punches. Lexi narrowed her eyes, she reeled a fist back and thrusted it forward, particularly surprising Zamasu because he saw a flare of aura from her fingertips.

"You humans never fail to surprise me." Zamasu chuckled.

"It's our pleasure." Lexi replied just as smartly, the Kaioshin could only glance to his side before reacting quickly. He literally picked Lexi up and moved her from her position because Adrian was flying backwards. The music producer flipped back and zoomed forward to his own fight.

Meanwhile, Zamasu just realized that Lexi's chest was very close to his face. "Uhh, thanks." She smiled down at him. "You can put me down now-"

He already _did_ , sure enough. "You would've gotten hurt. Don't mention it." Zamasu crossed his arms, seeming all boss-like.

Lexi nodded, but took a deeper breath with the adrenaline having left her body. "You're really strong."

Zamasu gave her an offended look. "Indeed."

"I can't even hit you or anything." She pouted. "That's not fair."

"Well, you aren't inclined to martial arts like Jay or Shona or I am. It is understandable." He said. Lexi nodded. "So don't go _picking fights_ with me."

"We're _sparring_ , what am I supposed to do?" She playfully punched his arm. "Let's continue."

Zamasu shrugged, her two fingers came at him and he held them between his index and middle finger. She attempted to kick him as well, but he held her leg and flipped her over. She sideways somersaulted to the floor, but quickly got herself up when she noticed that Zamasu, from where he originally was, _disappeared_.

"Try this!" Adrian flew upwards and raised both hands to the sky, yellow energy accumulating above his palms. He threw it straight down at both the Champion martial artists, the blast itself created a cracked crater that was about eight feet deep and twenty feet wide. Jay and Shona had jumped out of the way, Adrian swarmed in on Shona before his feet could even hit the ground, rendering the two in an airborne fist flurry fest. Adrian felt a kick to his side, sending him just _inches_ away from the edge of the platform.

Adrian nearly scraped his palm against the floor to keep himself from falling off. He lifted his body only halfway when he saw a beige bottom of a shoe aiming at his head. Adrian swerved quicker than he could think, making whoever was aiming at him pass his body _completely_ and head towards the grassy ground. It was Lexi, and she had miscalculated her strike and ended up fly kicking right out of the ring.

" _Really_ now?"

"Your mistake, bro." Adrian shrugged. "Sorry."

She blew a raspberry at him. "Watch. You'll be next."

" _Sure_." Adrian said, even though he turned right around to see the _insane_ free-for-all of ki blasts, zaps, and powerful kick and punches being thrown between two strong men and a God.

He blinked; yup, he was _fucked_ at best. But that didn't stop him from joining in.

Jay had rounded up Zamasu quickly once a orange flaring Shona lotus kicked Zamasu to the ground, a _surprising_ feat on Zamasu's part, but to be fair, Shona had to power up in order to do that. The second Jay's foot was about to slam down against the Kaioshin's chest, he was kicked by Adrian.

Pulling himself up quickly several meters away from his original fight, Jay watched as Adrian stepped forward with both hands beckoning him. The curly haired producer raised his eyebrows with a smug arch. " _Fight me,_ hoe."

Jay's smirk grew and he cracked his knuckles. " _Sure thing._ " He teleported to Adrian, adding ki energy to his punches because Adrian _asked for it_. His friend could _only_ block for a while before he decided to strike back, snatching Jay right off his own feet with a sweeping kick.

Jay fell, but widened his eyes; he can feel the ground _shaking_ from the force of _Zamasu_ and _Shona's_ ongoing battle, the two looked like they were wisping orange and purple hues of energy bodies. The wind was picking up even further, and it influenced Jay to start flaring yellow energy from his body as well. The younger champion too got up, his body becoming warmer and lighter, and he hopped on one foot with a smile on his face. Adrian watched the small yellow glow of Jay's aura, he himself had recalled how to do this since Jay taught him out of curiosity. His body started radiating yellow as well, but not as much as Jay's since he couldn't emit that much energy.

Jay had always told him in an almost proverbial sense; if you wanna scare your opponent, go ahead and turn into a flashlight. If you actually wanna fight, _maintain your battery juice._

Adrian stopped flaring, he started utilizing more power in his suddenly punch, Jay's shoes scraped against the ground as he whizzed backwards. The Mandalan chuckled. "Smart one."

"I'm don't have much to show off, first of all." Adrian smiled. "So I'm conserving."

"You'll _need_ to conserve," Jay crouched, ready to fly off to Adrian, "when you're fighting _me!_ "

The two had hit it off in a barrage of quick and sharp attacks, the ground below them moving and even some of the tiles falling off from the missed force of their hits. This was only from Jay and Adrian, but Zamasu and Shona were literally rippling the cold weather around them doing the _same_ they were doing. The grass was moving around so fast that some piece have fallen off, and now Lexi, being a bystander, had to hold her ponytail to keep it from whipping all over the place.

She knew they were having fun but _geez._

Shona had given Zamasu the Pung Kao Palm, one of the deadliest attacks when done correctly, against Zamasu's chest. Being he was a God, it was not enough to kill him but he was sent flying into the platform ground in less than a second. Zamasu got up quickly, having not been affected by the attack, and he raised his hand up to give a heavy chop to Shona's shoulder. This was without his God Split, so essentially Shona was also sent to the platform at a speed that created a giant crater. Debris flew _everywhere,_ Lexi had to cover herself from letting any of it fly into critical places.

"You guys!" She looked up once the dust settled, but a loud explosion went off from a rogue ki blast that hit the platform's surface, breaking almost a _quarter_ of the platform apart. Another wave of debris went rampant, she shielded her eyes and stood up. " _Hey_!"

Jay threw a wave of ki balls at Adrian, who had swerved and dodged every single one with almost the same finesse as James had in basketball. When they made contact with the ground, they would detonate and break off even more pieces of its surface.

They were _really_ going to break this platform into bits if they don't stop. "Zamasu! Guys, call it quits!"

Shona heard Lexi call out, he looked towards her and raised a hand at the Kaioshin to signal him to look too. The platform used to be a large scale square that spanned a hundred feet… _now_ it looked nowhere near a square. There were many large and small chunks of the surface that flew all over the place, at most being even a few hundred meters away from the former platform itself, and the ground was _barely_ walkable at this point. The grassland that surrounded this platform had patches that looked like they just been _ripped_ off, and the wind around them settled once Adrian and Jay also stopped to look around.

Adrian blinked. "Well… shit."

"Imagine how insane this would look to someone who was just strolling." Jay shook his head but laughed at the thought. "We fucked it _up_."

Zamasu didn't even seem to flinch, neither did Shona, and for a reason that the superactor remembered to point out. "Zamasu can just do that magic thingy and revamp the entire scene in less than a minute."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "It's not a _magic thingy_."

"I don't know what it's called."

To be frank, Zamasu didn't have a name for it either. So he resorted to saying the most righteous thing a God does when they don't know the answer to something. "Don't worry about the name."

He raised a hand, and started moving the pieces all together. They revolved like a small planet in front of the guys and Lexi (who was gaping comically at the sight), before Zamasu started mending the pieces back into the platform with his creation abilities.

The entire platform was completed once again in a minute and some change. Once finished, the Kaioshin smiled and placed his hands on his hips proudly. "It is done."

Lexi blinked like eight times. "How in the heck…"

"...I hate you sometimes." Adrian shook his head at Zamasu.

"It is a birthright, Adrian." Green lips produced the _smuggest_ smirk in Desna's history. "Unfortunately given to a few privileged beings."

"But your race doesn't have good food though." Adrian crossed his arms and leaned forward, knowing he would one up Zamasu with that fact.

And he _did._ Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "Shut up."

"So we're done here." Jay took a deep breath, wiping the sweat off his exposed collarbone and forehead. "That was fucking _fun_."

"I agree." Shona clenched and unclenched his fists. "I haven't had a chance to do what I did today in awhile."

"That's what happens when you're strong; no one else can stand up to you." Adrian shrugged, earning another glare from Zamasu. "Okay, _maybe some_ people could stand up to you… geez."

Zamasu chuckled. "I'm quite impressed by all four of you." He nodded. "You all are a lot stronger than I had imagined."

"Can't you _sense_ how strong we are?" Lexi asked, having brought herself back onto the platform with the guys.

"You guys aren't marginally distinguishable in my radar, since your power does not compare to mine." Zamasu gave them a weirdly kind smile to supplant his ' _You're Not On My Level'_ response.

"Nice way of saying we're all too weak for _him_." Jay crossed his arms. "Shona can object to that."

Zamasu raised both his hands admittedly. "Okay yes, Shona is _toe-to-toe_ with me. Sort of. Kind of." He backtracked even more. " _Maybe."_

"Too afraid to admit that I'm really _close_ to your level?" Shona smiled, but patted Zamasu's shoulder. "I don't mind it."

There was a tiny glint in Shona's eyes that Zamasu could see very well. Everything in those Mandalan brown eyes said _I'm gonna surpass you one day_. An older version, the version of him five months ago, would have lambasted Shona and all of Desna's humanoid beings with one fell swoop of his hand. That version of him would have sought to beat and kill the shit out of Shona for being as audacious as he is to imply that he could surpass him without even _saying_ so.

But now… Zamasu just smiled. He looked forward to seeing Shona's full extent of power.

"I'm sure you don't." He patted Shona's shoulder, they were literally buddies right now, second to James and he.

"You guys wanna go back?" Jay asked. "We gotta walk though… unless if Zamasu wants to taxi us."

"I have no problem with that." Zamasu said.

"You can take multiple people at once?" Lexi asked.

"It is something the angel of this Universe can do with ease, but yes I can. There is only four of you." Zamasu shrugged.

That sparked a question of interest in Jay. "There's an _angel_ in our universe too?"

"Yes. She is the attendant of the God of Destruction here."

"That actually makes sense now!" Adrian said. "So there _is_ a God of Destruction! Told you."

Jay rolled his eyes. "Shush it."

Adrian returned the sass back, and answered Zamasu's confused facial expression. "Me and him were hypothesizing before, since if there is a God of Creation, then there should be one of Destruction. Y'know, for balance and stuff."

The fact that twenty six year old _Adrian_ got the gist of this better than the thousands of years old Zamasu _we_ knew was almost disappointing, but this Zamasu was quite entertained by the fact that these guys sat down and gave his godhood a bit of thought.

"Ahhh, I see." He nodded. "All of you, hold on to each other and then whoever is left will hold my hands."

They got into formation, but not without realizing what this particularly looked like. Shona frowned almost instantly. "A friendship circle?"

" _No_ , just…" Zamasu saw that Adrian and Jay were both taken, so that left Shona's left man and Lexi's right to Zamasu. "Just grab my hand, dammit." Shona was his right hand, and Lexi was his left. Lexi's hands were soft, he almost accidentally caressed them under his thumb.

 _Accidentally._ _Almost._ Don't get your hopes up.

The five had teleported out of the platform premise and back into the suite's living room. The humans didn't take their phones with them, because why the heck would they do that? Even Lexi left her phone here.

And the second they were in, the woman had went to quickly get her device.

"What are you so uppity for?" Jay raised a brow at his girlfriend.

"I gotta check my messages!" Lexi grabbed her phone off the coffee table, and spun to plop down on the couch with a smile on her face.

"Who are your texting of such importance?" Zamasu raised a brow as well, his question _did not mean_ to sound incriminating, and luckily, Jay knew that.

"A friend." Lexi could only glance up at him. "We were in the middle of a convo before I left."

James had strolled into the room, hearing the sound of his friends' voices. "Lexi, your phone hasn't went off ever since after you left."

"They must have thought I was ignoring them, dangit. Let me live." Lexi said, subconsciously keeping the gender of this friend clandestine. She didn't mean to keep her growing friendship with Ambrose a secret, she would swear on that.

"James." Zamasu was _happy_ to see the basketball player all sprung and positive. Over the course of the past month, their acquaintancy gradually grew into amicability. _Now_ , due to the past four days, these two became _peachy fucking friends._

Literally, they had long conversations in the morning, when the two would go alone to catering places. Zamasu asked James if he felt any sort of hatred for Irene for straight up slapping and insulting him. James had said that he was angry as hell one that first night, but he didn't harbor any ill will to her at all. That response earned much respect from Zamasu even though he now despised Irene ever more.

He and James _dapped up_ , which was something that Zamasu learned from him like yesterday. Adrian, Jay and Shona watched with shocked faces, the first two of the latter had their jaws dropped.

"Since when did Zamasu have such _zest_?" Adrian walked over to the two.

"Since yesterday." James said. "You guys should freshen up, you're all sweaty and shit- well, except for Zamasu."

It was true; Zamasu hadn't broken that much of a sweat throughout the spar. Adrian, Jay and Lexi had decided to take part in James' advice, while Shona thanked Zamasu for approaching him in battle.

"Why would you need to thank me for that?"

"Why not?" Shona shrugged, and the two shook hands before Shona had departed. Zamasu turned to James, seeing that he was now in the kitchen grabbing himself one of those protein shakes he bought earlier.

He entered the kitchen, placing a hand on the counter table. "How are things progressing?"

James stopped shaking the bottle for a moment. "What things?"

" _The_ things." Zamasu didn't need to extrapolate for James to get it.

" _Ohhh_." James snorted. " _Progressing_? Listen, I did everything I could. There is no going back with her all of the sudden. I'm _still_ surprised."

Zamasu chuckled. He would have to admit, even if Irene is an idiot, he really did _not_ expect her to react like this, or even going as far as to insult his grandaunt's whitebed. It surprised him too, to be frank. "So what have you been doing then? You know they do live with us, technically."

"Rebecca and Irene have been going out more often." James looked down at his drink, frowning. "Of course it's probably because Rebecca is on her side."

"It's _definitely_ because of that, James." Zamasu didn't understand why James said _probably_ to that fact. "Those two… I could see why they are best friends."

" _That's not nice_ , Zamasu." James waved a finger in front of him with a smirk. Zamasu wiped it away. "I still feel kind of guilty though."

"Why?" Zamasu shrugged. "You did nothing wrong intentionally."

"Well _yeah_ , but still-"

"But still nothing." Zamasu shook his head. "It was not your fault. Whoever that woman is, she had no self control."

James slowly nodded. "You're right…" He sighed. "I just hope things at least clear out and she'll actually listen."

"It's _Irene_ : she's an idiot."

"You're being petty again."

"I'm being _factual_ , evidently." Zamasu crossed his arms.

"I thought it wasn't right for you to take sides." James narrowed his eyes.

"I'll only take sides for _righteous_ things." Zamasu smirked. "Don't put my words back in my mouth."

"Fine, fine." James took a nice sip of his drink. He walked away from the fridge, passed Zamasu, and then turned around to walk backwards while facing him. "On other news though, since I don't wanna delve deep into that, I called my coach to see how things were going with an upcoming party."

Zamasu raised a brow. "Mhmm?"

"He said that it would be pushed back a couple to a few weeks."

Zamasu frowned, he felt compelled to know the reason behind this for some reason. "Why?"

James backtracked a little. "Okay, okay, here's the full story right; he was heading out of our main gym building late at night, and these three guys came up to him wearing nothing but black. They bribed him, into giving money for something they found on behalf of our team."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "Is this from those haphazard criminals again?"

"More than likely." James shook his head. "I don't understand why he would postpone it though."

"Is there something your coach is hiding?"

There was; his coach _did not_ tell James that the reason he was holding this party back was because there had been a swarm of attempted breaches into the gym building, and also through many of team players' bank accounts and profiles. This happened over the week while James was gone, and those men who came up to him told his coach that they needed James, or else they'll wreak havoc on everyone else that he knew.

James knew that he was being sought for but not so much as to _that_. "I don't think so." James said. "He could only give me a brief answer, since he had to be somewhere. I might call him later to ask of it more."

Zamasu shook his head he was getting a _weird_ feeling in his gut. "This might have something to do with you."

"What, with the whole 'someone's after me' schtick?" James arched his brows. "If they want me, then they could _try and get me_ , but if they're gonna harm anyone I know, then I'll post up."

Zamasu's eyes went wide; listen, he was all for bravery and confidence but the Kaioshin was certain that James was _nowhere_ near even Lexi's level in combat. "Really?"

" _Yes."_

"You can't do that all by yourself, you know." Zamasu looked down. "If something does happen, it would be wiser to call upon your strong friends."

James looked elsewhere. "Like Jay, Zach- definitely Mace, he's got the whole police force under his belt- and Shona."

" _And me._ " Zamasu frowned. "Why do you all keep forgetting that my prowess exists?"

"Hasn't Adrian voiced this before? We don't want you to get _that much_ involved with everything because like… You're a god." James shrugged. "We can't go to you for everything."

Something about that statement sounded riveting to Zamasu's ears. The exact opposite would have been said if Zamasu weren't a tangible entity. "But I will _not_ let this stand on my behalf!"

" _Okay, okay_ fine dammit. You can join in on the war. Geez."

"Don't _geez_ me." Zamasu crossed his arms as the two walked out of the kitchen and down the hallway to their rooms. "I take injustices _seriously_."

"Right, right, the last thing I want is for you to carry us because you're so strong." James smiled. "That wouldn't be fun."

Zamasu narrowed his eyes, sarcasm oozed out of his voice. "That's considerate of you."

"Bro, shush."

"I'm a God, I do not _shush_." James stopped, turned on his hell to stand in front of Zamasu. The Kaioshin shrugged. "What? You can't say anything to rebuke that."

" _You know…_ " James said, and then he caved in. "You're right, screw it."

"See?"

James shook his head. "I'm gonna go to that bar again. There is someone I gotta see."

Zamasu furrowed a brow. "Who?"

"A friend that works there." The man smiled. "Pretty nice woman, I gotta say."

"The one that you were talking to?" Zamasu knew exactly who this female is. They both stopped right in front of James' door.

"Yup." James nodded. " _Listen_ , I don't have any other ideas other than being friends if that's what you're looking at me like that for."

"I wasn't _thinking_ anything of that nature." Zamasu shrugged. "You can go and do that, I have someone I want to see as well."

 _James_ furrowed a brow, and since Zamasu likes being petty, he responded: " _And who is that?"_

" _A friend."_ Zamasu smirked when James narrowed his eyes. "But he isn't in Intima."

"Back at Tycho?"

"Mmhmm." Zamasu nodded.

"Isn't it like in the morning there right now?"

Zamasu nodded again. "But he stays up quite late anyway."

" _Oh_." James said. "Go have fun with that. I'ma go and get all freshened up." The man turned around to open his door, he took a step into his bedroom.

"James."

James turned around at the sudden call from the Kaioshin. Zamasu continued. "If need be, leave Irene and find someone else. Maybe even that woman if she is of your fancy."

James looked downwards. A tiny rumor had become a full fledged segregator for the both of them. The future was very grim for him and this relationship, he was almost considering calling it quits because… why stay with someone that already sees you as a cheater?

All James could say, before closing the door, was: "I'll see to it."

Zamasu looked at the door, then to the ground, and then down the right corridor to some of the other doors. That was where Rebecca's room was, situated right next to Irene's. He shook his head, and then teleported himself out of the motel, and into an area in Tycho.

 **~~~.~~~**

"So you're in Intima with your friends?"

"Yes." The Kaioshin nodded.

"What about a _lady_ friend?" Mace smirked. "It's very rare for anyone to go to Intima without a significant other, y'know."

"He's a _god,_ Mace." Chandler came around the lounge room of Mace's large house. "You really think he's gonna associate with humans like that?"

" _Exactly_ , Chandler. Thank you." Zamasu commended the AI.

" _Okay okay, sure._ " Mace raised both hands.

"But why would it be rare?" Zamasu frowned.

"Intima is one of the most romantic cities out there." Mace. "They're well known for their bars and love hotels, man."

That made a part of Zamasu's stomach flip because he was one of those with Lexi. Give him a break, please. " _Right."_

"All that aside, you came here to tell us something very important." Chandler placed Mace's requested bottle of sparkling water down on his table. The AI went to sit, negotiator style, on the couch with his hands folded together on his chin. "Tell us."

Zamasu casted his glance at Mace. "It's about James."

"Did something happen to him?" Mace frowned. "Last I heard, he was with you and Jay and all them."

"He's fine. He told me about something that his coach said to him earlier today." Zamasu looked at the both of them, they _both_ had responsive expressions. "He told him of some sort of party that needed to be cancelled because of a bargain."

" _Now there we go_." Mace snapped his fingers. He explained when Zamasu frowned at him. "One of the local departments in upper West City reported Coach Fray, James' team coach of course, to have called them of this bargain." Mace sat up. "He specifically said to us that they were asking for him to bring James to them, or else they would threaten to 'harass the team' as a whole."

Zamasu looked down at the floor. "So my suspicions were correct."

"How so?" Chandler asked.

"James only told me that his coach gave him a brief story, that didn't involve this whole situation being about him." Zamasu's eyes went to the right of the floor. "I already surmised that it was the group that's been after him for quite a while now."

"Of course, his coach would not express _that piece of knowledge_ to him, even though James does not according to Adrian." Chandler said. "We have tracked down the people who have been attacking their gym building, they were too easy to find. They have been arrested already."

"That's good to hear at least." Zamasu nodded. "As long as they can't come close to threatening the lives of innocent people."

"I thought you hated humans-"

" _Mace._ " Zamasu raised a hand objectively. Chandler chuckled. "This is _injustice_ , we are speaking on behalf of- do not laugh Chandler."

"I wasn't laughing." Chandler furrowed a mechanical brow at him. "I was just pushing out a loosened strain of my metaphorical vocal chords."

Because Zamasu read something on behalf of AIs not being able to laugh or cry, that made him roll his eyes. "Shush."

"To make a short story even shorter," Mace brought the attention back of the two back, "We got the calls, we've been arresting those guys like nothing. That's it, so far on that part, everything is under control. There is tightened security around that area, some of the local policeman have taken to being undercover around the premise."

"There wasn't much to do, actually. It wasn't as big as an open bomb or anything." Chandler shrugged. "Do not worry your godly head. We got this."

"I'm sure you _do_." Zamasu smiled. It was nice, seeing these weaker-than-him individuals not depend on someone stronger than them. They weren't afraid of taking on the trials and tribulations of their own race, and he's noticing that more and more often; how they are attempting to manage themselves.

It was touching, really.

"Did anything else occur to you, Mace?" Chandler narrowed his cool blue eyes at the director. "Anything of _conscious-wakening_ matters?"

"Look- okay, it was _my bad_." Mace reassured. "You don't even sleep!"

"What is this about, now?" Zamasu blinked.

"Well," Mace inhaled, "I'm sure you know of this situation better than me; I did get an angry Jay, messaging me at like, I dunno, _three in the morning_ this one night. He calls right? And he's already off the mouth while I'm still trying to figure what day it is, telling me about this altercation James got into with his girlfriend."

Zamasu snorted so loud, it made the other two male individuals slightly jump. He excused himself. "I'm sorry. It was just… it was a mess."

"Judging from how pissed Jay was while eating a breakfast sandwich, I _believe_ so." Mace shook his head, taking another sip of his water. "From what I remember, out of the like, maybe seven times I've met Irene, I would have never expected her to act that way."

"None of them did." Zamasu raised a hand to his chest. " _I_ did, however."

" _Yeah_ , but that's you being petty."

"No _God_ is ever pe-"

" _Zamasu."_ Chandler sat straight. "Hit him with that god talk one more time, I swear."

"And what are you going to do about it?" Zamasu narrowed his grey eyes at the blue eyed AI.

Chandler opened his mouth, closed it, then shrugged his shoulders while nodding. "I'll be very upset."

"I can't reinstate the truth?"

"We heard _enough truth_." Chandler leaned forward, and Zamasu tilted his head with a tiny smirk. Visual cues were easy for the AI to read, so that expression Zamasu gave him read _I am not afraid of doing it again… hoe._ Be advised that Zamasu would never use that last word in his long life.

There was a beeping like sound that was almost inadmissible to the ear, but because of the acoustics in the lounge room, both Zamasu and Mace picked it up. Chandler raised the hand to the two males allowing them to proceed with what they were saying while he answered it, knowing exactly who this person is. "You need me to carry, don't you?"

On the other hand, Ambrose had one hand on the yoke, or steering wheel, of his personal private jet. The other hand was situated right by where his phone was standing before it moved to the propulsing ignition. "Are you aware of the time over here?"

"I _know_ , it's pretty late." Chandler shrugged, looking at the Kaioshin in particular.

" _Pretty_ late _?_ " Ambrose frowned at his phone screen as if Chandler was right there. "I'm pretty sure it's like 4:50 in the morning."

Chandler glanced at the clock across from where the god and the man were speaking. He wasn't _wrong._ "... _yeah, it is._ " When he heard Ambrose's quiet chuckle, he shook his head. "I'm sure you're still flying right?"

"The country is right in view of me." Ambrose smiled, looking down at Efilia's large terrain. He was looking down at the winter, snowy and breezy wonderlands in the North. "I'll only be gone for maybe a week or so."

Chandler shrugged. "That's fine by me."

"Who are you talking to?" Mace asked.

"Who else?" Chandler smirked. "The _golden boy_ himself."

He could hear Ambrose's protest to that name, but he chose to ignore it with a smug expression on his shiny features.

"Ambrose, hmm?" Zamasu _refused_ to let that random, incomprehensible smile grow on his face. "Tell him I said hi."

Mace seconded that, and Chandler nodded. "By the way, Mace here says hi, and since green God here knows everybody and their uncle's left-handed cousin, he says hi too." Chandler tapped his own forearm to put in on speaker.

The two heard a very jovial ' _Hiiiii_ ' from the engineer himself. Again, Zamasu suppressed the need to smile.

The two returned the greeting, and Chandler went back to looking down at his forearm. "Alright, I think you could let me off now. I'll be more than happy to carry for you."

"Thank you." The engineer said, putting his jet on setdown mode. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight to you too." Chandler nodded and ended the call on his forearm. "Welp, I got much to do next morning. If anything happens however, Mace, be sure to call me or the other Hyperions."

Mace smiled. "No problem, could always count on y'all."

"Hyperions?" Zamasu furrowed a brow. "Watchers of the ground? Who are they?"

"Chandler refers to his longtime AI companions and himself as hyperions, since they do, in essence, watch over and work with many outlets around the world." Mace explained. "Be surprised; this guy _actually_ has friends."

" _Masahide_." Chandler went stern on the director, using his real name.

"What?" Mace smirked as he stood up. "It's funny."

"We aren't friends… well, two out of six of us aren't." Chandler looked down.

Mace kissed his teeth. "Oh, leave Bee and Rogue alone, they're just dickheads by default."

" _Exactly."_ Chandler paused to look at the Kaioshin who had a look of straight confusion. "Zamasu's just like 'what the heck are you guys talking about'?"

"I'm rather taking this as a signal of us being done with our chat." Zamasu smiled. "You two look about ready to sleep."

" _I do?_ "

"Chandler, shut up. You know what I meant."

The yellow AI tilted his head with a charming shitty grin. "I do." He repeated himself in a different context. "I'm sure Mace here is as tired as _the both of us._ I'll take my leave to let you sleep."

Mace nodded. "Great call, because I am kinda starting to get tired." Mace stretched. "Thank you guys for uhh… for coming."

Zamasu blinked. "I just showed up but… you're very welcome." It was true though, he literally came in here and the three started talking about several cases and things that have went down in the past week. "Goodnight Mace. Goodnight, Chandler."

"G'night to the both of youse." Chandler raised a salute with his hand to his left brow at the guys before opening Mace's door to take the stairs downwards. That left Zamasu and Mace alone for a moment. There was a tiny notification sound that went off in his kitchen, and the director looked at Zamasu a bit longer.

"Jay just texted asking of where you are." Mace smiled, both his hands empty and his pockets free of any devices.

Zamasu tilted his head and place his hands on his hips to ask a rhetorical question. "Is your phone even _with_ you?"

" _Theoretically,_ he texted me." Mace smiled brightly. "I'm certain he probably is wondering where you are at now."

"More than likely." Zamasu said. "I'll be on my way. Go and have a good sleep."

"I reckon if I _could_ , with all my work I gotta manage." Mace pointed to the ' _Dreaded Cabinet of Anger and Fret'_ as he would dub it. The man chuckled a bit and then waved Zamasu off. "Goodnight, my fren'."

Zamasu nodded, and teleported back into the sweet confines of his suite room. He went to sit down by the windowsill, noticing the house being primarily quiet.

 _It was only like 11:54 right now_ , and everyone was already asleep. These humans get tired easily.

He took to reading some articles and writtens on his phone. He mayhaps missed the feeling of a book in his hands and the need to flip the pages over, but a phone was always lighter an easily accessible. Instead of texting and worrying about social status, he used this time to learn more about an ancient 'species' or race of humanoids that he had stumbled upon in one article. The Kaioshin had found much information that he _had_ to digest later if he hops back onto this, but these specific people were known to be ancient world leaders who governed civilizations with their energy manipulation powers, and are born with attuned intuition and psychic abilities. These people were referred to as _Mystics_.

After about three hours of reading he closed the article, deciding to take to more recreational activities like… _sleeping_ ; somewhere in the middle of his reading, he realized that his bed was hella fucking soft, and there's no way he wasn't going to take advantage of that. Zamasu placed the phone on the other side of the room and _took of his gi_ before laying down. Within two minutes, he had easily willed himself to sleep.

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

It was in the afternoon, he knew that from feeling the warmth of the sun's rays against his upper chest. He frowned though, it wasn't silent and quiet as it normally was, but he heard _a lot of_ chatter coming from the living room. There were really fast footsteps heading down the hall and towards his room door, which was yanked open by Adrian.

"ZAMASU- oh shit, you're asleep."

He cocked his neck back into his pillow at the booming sound of Adrian's voice. He sat up to give Adrian a cross look. "Why are you yelling?"

"My bad." Adrian chuckled. "I got really excited because a certain someone just arrived."

Zamasu lazily swung his legs over the bed. Adrian was surprised to see him… _gi-less_ , but he can see that Zamasu didn't want to get up and meet someone right now. Though he asked: "And who would that be?"

He seriously was not expecting Adrian's response to be so giddy. "Ambrose."

Without even thinking about it, Zamasu _shot up_ to stand at a speed quicker than what Adrian's eyes could catch. " _What?!"_ He realized his actions, not knowing _where_ they came from, and then sat down slowly. "He's actually here?"

"Mmhmm." Adrian smiled. "Why are you so happy?"

"I'm not _happy_ over seeing another _mortal_." Zamasu frowned, offended. He refused to acknowledge any incoming reason for Adrian's question. "Allow me to put my gi back on, I will be down in a minute."

Adrian narrowed his eyes as Zamasu stood up _normally_ this time to get his gi. " _Right._ He's outside, just to let you know." Adrian closed the door, leaving the _faux_ uninterested God standing there with his gi halfway on. He sighed and shook his head; these famous humans, so riled up over a handsome thirty year old wealthy man with an overtaxed IQ that he, Zamasu, was always randomly visiting and talking to… and staring at… _No_ he was not particularly sprung in knowing that this man was here, he couldn't care less about Ambrose's existence…

Do not ask why the _second_ he had finished preparing himself, he teleported _right_ outside of the suite just to see that man.

Ambrose was standing right by Lexi, leaning on the front passenger seat window of his personal car. The others were in front of the two, and Lexi was introducing him to every single one of them.

"...And that's Rebecca over there, by the way." Lexi jubilantly pointed at the doctor who was substantially distanced from the two.

"Good afternoon to you, Ambrose." Adrian extended a hand out for the engineer to shake. He had a firm, businessman-like grip, but his hands were soft and warm.

"Good afternoon to all of you." Ambrose addressed everyone as a whole. "I am familiar with every one of your names, there is no need for introductions here."

Notably, Ashley got _really_ bright when he said that. "Did you pick out a place to stay, or are you just visiting for today."

"I thought of staying for the entire week, so…" Ambrose shrugged. To be specific, the man had a reserved suite floor _just_ for him at any time he decides to come by.

"That's cool!" She walked up to him, looking up into those gold eyes with much interest. "What about your corporation?"

"I have someone carrying that for me." Ambrose smiled down at her. "Don't worry about that."

Rebecca in particular stayed away from him, she was behind everyone else along with James, but the two weren't _close_ to one another. The basketball player didn't have much to stake against him, so he wasn't afraid to give a kind greeting, but Rebecca had only waved at him.

Irene was more than happy to approach him, he was good looking. "So ya wanna come along for lunch with us?" Her hands were folded together in front of her, giving her a chaste look. "We're probably gonna head out to a buffet quite soon."

James peeped her actions. He peeped the way she brushed past him as if he didn't exist, she's done this for nearly a week now. But what he peeped _more_ , was Ambrose's response.

The golden-eyed male raised his brows and shrugged nonchalantly. "Eh sure, why not?"

It was at that moment Zamasu decided to make himself known. He had a feeling that as he approached Ambrose knew he was coming but didn't feel the need to look at him. He can tell that much by the perpetual growing smile on his face, and when Zamasu was close enough, he looked at the god with a kind smile. Zamasu almost slowed his pace… was Ambrose getting _younger_?

Why are his eyes much more magnificent to stare into?

"Zamasu." The engineer smiled brightly, before turning to everyone else. "Don't worry, I particularly know him."

"Oh, _we know_." Jay nodded. "He talks about you a lot."

"No I don't." Why Zamasu answered him would remain anonymous. He turned to face Ambrose again. "It is nice to see you again."

It was. It was _more than nice_.

It was refreshing.

"Nice to see you too." Ambrose had this coy look about him when he _particularly_ looked at the Kaioshin, his eyes were narrow and his brows would arch. "I'm sure you're heading out with the rest of us, hnn?"

"Of course I am." Zamasu pliantly smiled, turning to everyone else. "You all are ready, right?"

Everyone had on outside wear, clad in jackets and boots. Lexi's jacket looked absolutely stunning; it went down to her knees and hugged every curve on her body. He didn't need a jacket, this weather was nothing for him, and apparently it wasn't for Ambrose either because the engineer was wearing a thick, velvet navy blue under armour-like sweater. And it was like 30 degrees out.

"We're good." James said. "We can go; I'm hungry."

Adrian agreed. "Me too."

"You ate like three hours ago." Jay narrowed his eyes at the other producer.

Adrian crossed his arms. "Stop being my wife, three hours is a _long ass time_."

Ambrose chuckled, for some reason his quiet chuckle brought the attention of everyone back to him. "We'll be on our way then." Like _magic,_ since Ambrose did order a limo here as well, the second he raised his left hand, a damn limo pulled up. He looked back and pointed with his thumb. "Get in."

The others were particularly mystified at the _smoothness_ of that, but they got in the limo before Ambrose and Zamasu did. The Kaioshin walked beside him without even realizing it, but when he did he played it off as nothing. "Only for a week?"

"Mmhmm." Ambrose nodded. "Why? You want me to stay longer?"

"I couldn't care less."

"Are you _sure_ about that?"

"I am _positive._ " Zamasu gave him the _scariest_ of glares, but Ambrose just smiled at him like an asshole.

The engineer looked down at the ground. "Sure."

Zamasu hated that reply.

The limo ride was quite entertaining, mostly because everyone was _asking_ Ambrose about his life and his doings, which Lexi got in the way of and asked everyone to let him 'enjoy being here instead of being interviewed'. Zamasu watched how close the two were, she was almost always reciprocating more than he was and that was just Lexi being extroverted. For some reason, he didn't find it weird when they got into the actual buffet, and she sat right next to Ambrose with Jay to her left.

Maybe it was because Jay was mostly unreactive to that.

The server came around to ask for how many people were here. When he saw _Ambrose_ , he damn near froze in his loafers. "...So there's nine of you?" They all nodded. Rebecca in particular sat up, she was closest to the server and was about to say something before Ambrose had called out to him.

"It's all on me."

The other eight individuals looked at the multi trillionaire, who looked at everyone else and shrugged. "What? Why not treat you guys to something at least?"

"But we don't want you to spend too much..." Adrian accidentally said, which made everyone _slowly_ turn to him. Ambrose giggled.

"It's fine, Adrian." Ambrose waved his hand, and gave the server his card so that he could swipe it. He took it back with the server giving him a kind 'enjoy your meal' before leaving. "Go, help yourselves out."

They had given Ambrose warm 'thank you's out of gratitude, and went to fetch themselves food. They gave back, and chatted and talked with one another. There was a lot of positive energy floating about for them, and even some of the people who were in the buffet had came up to Ambrose to either greet him, or take a picture with him. _Women in particular_ would ask for the pictures, Lexi had noticed this with a pinch of salt.

 _Only_ a pinch.

Rebecca had taken to eating since she was hungry, but the second he did what she always did for these people, her blood started to heat up. She was always buying and making sure everyone in the group got to enjoy themselves under her belt, yet that is barely acknowledged, but when _Ambrose_ does it, now it's something that's deemed important? Why would he even do that in the first place, he doesn't even know them! And yet here everyone is, sitting in a circle with Ambrose in the middle talking to him and sharing stories and shit, he's just trying to soap them up and win them over by showing off how fucking rich he is. A trillion dollars can't make up for a showoff.

It _completely_ bothered Rebecca whenever Lexi talked about him, whenever she hear his name, even looking at him now made her angry. And seeing her friend also move away from her and gravitate to this exotic, avaricious, _deceiving_ man pulled her gut down to her roots. Oh, that handsome face was nothing but a pretense, he's just _playing_ everyone here. He took her two friends from her, he's basically here to show off his riches and disguises it as _acts of kindness._ He's not kind, and she doesn't like him at _all..._

She absolutely hated him even more.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Yup. Turns out a powered up Shona can reach up to Zamasu's** _ **not trying**_ **level. No, Zamasu did not need to power up at all while fighting anyone, they all aren't** _ **that**_ **strong. Don't come for me.**

 **Is it jealousy? Or is it skepticism? Whatever it is, Rebecca is** _ **not happy**_ **that Ambrose is here.**

 **So, these hitman groups are trying to scare everyone into handing James over. It gets even worse, hopefully they won't touch his grandaunt.**

 **Keep in mind that Chandler is technically within the highest echelons of the government, even if he isn't directly working with them. He and the other AIs are like the gatekeepers to this world, so he knows** _ **much**_ **.**


	38. Right to Counsel

**«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Right to Counsel**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Lexi had been out with out with Ambrose over the past two days. She would leave like somewhere in the evening, after saying bye to her boyfriend, and head out to where _she told_ Ambrose to be at. The two would only either have dinners, or go out to play pool (which Ambrose was killer at, he beat her in every damn game). Every time they had finished, he would offer her to drive her back and the two would talk a whole lot in the car. Lexi would reluctantly leave, give him a sweet hug goodbye, before walking into the suite.

Today morning, she took to looking at the clothes that she had recently brought. Since everyone else is out today, she had opted for Jay to stay the night here because there was something she wanted to show him. The woman had bought many new outfits and other items alike, but she herself needed a separate pair of eyes to judge this _one_ article of clothing that she hasn't worn in quite a while. There was only one other person in and near the suite right now.

Zamasu was sitting in the living room, reading a thingy from his phone again and munching on graham crackers. It was about the Mystics and where they came from; apparently they had originated as far as even the second earliest of civilizations, or around 12,000 years ago. They were known as the 'healers', the menders, and the proprietors of society. Between N10222 (in our terms 10,222 BC) were when the majority of people had started taking notice to how powerful these Mystics were. After the death of one of the 'normal' human world leaders, the majority populus would sought after anyone who exhibited Mystic behavior so that they can be executed. Since the Mystics are generally viewed as _evil_ , they were given the worst of sentences.

The only reason for their perceived maliciency is because normal humans do not understand them at all. This not something Zamasu thought of while reading this.

Mystics have altered DNA, or 'activated' DNA, that sets them apart from the normal consensus. As time passed and because they gravitated to other Mystics to procreate, their DNA strands became staple bloodlines for future generations. Unfortunately, that made them _easier_ to find and target. They are insanely powerful beings en masse and even individually, and have been known to cause the Great Marvels (a huge series of natural disasters that plagued Desna a little over 2,000 years ago for _three hundred_ years straight). Not much other research is said, and there isn't much on account of any Mystics alive _now_ , so those group of people were probably killed off for wreaking havoc around the world. The Mystic population is only counted off by the amount of their dead populus, it has never reached over 500,000.

That was the gist of what he could find, there wasn't much on their psychology, and much of this information has been put aside because of its irrelevancy. If there are any Mystics living, then they are probably gonna have to deal with living completely differently from everyone else.

That just bought up a random, probably unreasonable conspiracy: What if there were leftover Mystics that have been hiding for generations, and they decided to wreak havoc on the world _now_? Maybe they were sending out large amounts of regular humans to do their deeds for them because they were so energetically powerful. Maybe _they_ are responsible for the former black vans, and a sector of their group wants James and/or maybe Terry dead.

His brain is something else, ain't it? Speaking of Terry, how was that man doing anyway? He should go visit him one day, he was an interesting guy.

"Zamasu!"

He heard Lexi call his name out, and with the box of graham crackers in his hand, he went upstairs and over to where her door was. Apparently it was closed, and his sensitive ears picked up the sound of shuffling in her room. He gave the door only two knocks and within several seconds, Lexi opened a door enough for him to see only her face.

"I need a little bit of help, you don't mind critiquing how something looks on someone right?" She meant that in a way of saying that he wouldn't be bothered in a certain type of way by her wearing clothes, because he was a male. Zamasu did not catch that at all, he just shook his head.

She closed her door. "Good, because I went to this one place nearby, they had some really pretty things in there, and I can't really wait to try this one on." She giggled sheepishly, and the Kaioshin's lip twitched, "I would have just went downstairs to call you over, but I was and still am naked right now. You wouldn't mind right?"

One should _never_ put the fact that they are naked and inquiring if a person is cool with something in the same sentence. The Kaioshin somehow linked the two thinking that she was asking him if it was okay to see her naked. Almost instantly, Zamasu got flushed. "W-what?!"

"...You wouldn't mind seeing if this looks good on me, right? I mean, you did say that you don't have anything going for human women so… I reckon you'd be fine with helping me out a little." She repeated herself, and Zamasu exhaled in slight relief.

"...No."

"Alright, then." She giggled. Luckily, her door was closed so she wouldn't see the heat that had formed around Zamasu's cheeks, for no reason either. He just had to keep telling himself that all of these random fluxes of emotion were happening for no reason whatsoever, and everything will be fine. Everything will be _just_ dandy.

More sounds of shuffling were heard in her room as Zamasu continued to eat graham crackers, waiting patiently for Lexi to finish whatever she was doing.

The Kaioshin really didn't know what he was getting himself into.

After about five minutes, he heard her voice again. "I think it looks cool. I actually don't wear things like this regularly buuuuut- hold on, lemme put on these shoes," and then she spoke louder to address him, "and then I'll come out in a minute, alright?"

"Okay." He shrugged, at least he had a box of graham crackers with him, you know, to focus on eating instead of only hearing a woman change her clothes.

In less than a minute, he heard her door knob turn. "So just… stand right in front of the door, okay?"

He did so, holding the box in both of his hands while he was chewing on another cracker. Her door finally opened, and she revealed herself, in nothing more than a black faux-suede sleeveless halter jumpsuit. Her voluptuous curves were outlined in the fitting tightness of the jumpsuit, which accentuated her legs and her hips far too damn well. The top of it had a deep V-neck that ended just above her belly button, giving her chest a seductive looking cleavage. Her shoes were actually silver-studded and only went up to three inches.

Zamasu, in all due honesty, was not expecting anything like what she came out in, because she literally had the most nonchalant commentary on behalf of her outfit. But when she took a few steps back to open the door and he finally saw her, all he could do was just stare with his mouth slightly parted. _Oh…_ the graham cracker box in his hand dropped to the floor. _Ohh… oh no…_

 _By Kami_ , what _did_ he just get himself into?

It didn't make anything better with the fact that she had her hair in loose waves, and had such an amazing body along with it, coupled with how beautiful her face and her _damn orchid_ scent was just…

"Zamasu?"

He just blinked twice.

"...How do I look?"

He finally snapped out of whatever he was in just now. How could she possibly just say that she looked _cool_? This woman looked like a godde- wait, _no_. Zamasu knew better than to compare a mere mortal with a divine being, even though Lexi may as well be one of the most beautiful women he's ever seen in his entire life. He swallowed, why is getting so… worked up over this? That wasn't even the right terminology, but dammit he did not know what going on in his brain. "Uhhh… you look nice."

That was all he could say. That was all he managed to salvage sifting through his mind because apparently, his mouth wasn't working properly.

"Really? At first I thought it'd be too tight or something, but judging from the look on your face," her stupidly warm and beguiling giggle poured into his ears again, "this fits rather well on me." She turned while looking at her back, which was exposed and the strings that held up the V-neck made an X-formation on her back and connected with the bottom portion of her jumpsuit, which started at her lower back and gave decent exposure to her curved back. Any 'ass' man who saw her would probably get a nosebleed because her derriere was just as accentuated as her toned legs.

 _This isn't fair_ , he's been thinking that for a while now, _this isn't fair at all_. Not only was she pretty, had an exceptional personality, carried herself very well, and could fight very well being _really_ strong for a normal human being, but she even managed to look _far too gorgeous_ in anything she wore, and just about made the Kaioshin question his sanity ten times more than usual in the past month and a half. It's just not fair! How in the heavens did _she_ come into fruition?!

"Hey."

He blinked, and looked down at her because she was now in front of him, holding the box of crackers in her hand. "You uh… dropped this. And thanks for helping."

"What did I help with? All I did was tell you that you looked… nice." He really tried his hardest not to look her over again.

"Well I bought it because I liked it, but I didn't know if it was looking good on me." She walked back to her room with that damned cat-like gait again. Sometimes, he swore that she was doing this on purpose, he really wanted to believe that, but this is just how she is with almost anyone. Lexi leaned against her door frame with a smile on her face. "And I also wanted to surprise Jay with this, but I needed a little bit of feedback. Nobody's here other than you and me, and I know you don't like human women so…"

 _ **No you don't**_ _. Shut up._

He told himself to shut up again. This is just great. "Oh…"

"Yup. I'll see you in a bit probably, if I don't end up falling asleep." A chuckle escaped her lips and she closed her door. Zamasu turned, and quietly went back down the stairs, to the living room, and sat back down on the loveseat. When he was situated, he propped his elbow against the armrest and rested his temple against his fingers with the most frustrated/conflicted/shook expression on his face.

He blinked, took the deepest breath possible and exhaled, there was no way he was coming back down after witnessing all of _that_.

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

Overnight in Intima, Zamasu took to flying back to Tycho. He did so after he had walked along one of the snowy bridges with Ambrose. It was around 2AM when they both walked, randomly discussing things and looking out at the scenery before them. He kind of didn't want to leave Intima just because of its beautiful scenery, nor did he want to leave the bridge and Ambrose behind temporarily.

It was rare for him to say something like this; he actually did miss how silly Ambrose was. It was as if they hadn't seen each other in years, with how throaty and nostalgic Zamasu got when he saw him pull up by their suite. Those innocent golden eyes had a universe of their own, and his smile was as bright as the yellow sun above. It felt homely, just to be on that bridge even though it was his first time there.

He'll definitely be there with Ambrose again.

Once he was above the outskirts of West City, he decided to swallow the bit of warmth building up in his core. He looked around, this area gave a nice view of upper South City, he could faintly see from here. It was in the morning of Tycho, the area he was at was where the newest admin assistant lived.

He seriously didn't come here on purpose; he just _stopped_ and realized that this place looked familiar. His eyes glazed around before coming back to see Ethan's wall window open and exposed, revealing a young woman who was throwing random items. He then saw Ethan himself come into view, and _boy_ … he would be lying if he said that Ethan _wasn't_ furious.

He could never imagine _Ethan_ of all people becoming assertively angry, he wasn't thoring anything, but he sure looked like he was yelling. After several seconds, Zamasu watched as Ethan back out of whatever he wa sin. He left his own house and went straight to his car.

When Ethan sat down, his held his head in his palm and shook it; he was _absolutely_ done with having this woman near him. Even her _breathing_ in his direction gave him angina.

His phone had vibrated, he was texting Terry early this morning since the gynecologist had work early today before he had gotten into this argument with his girlfriend; she had a father who was involved in much of the criminal justice field, so if he did even the _smallest_ of things she could twist shit up and make him lose a substantial amount of anything. Can he even call her that now? _Ugh._

He driven away from his house, and onto the off-road of the route that led to South City. He stopped his car and took a deep breath, he was still bloody pissed. He sighed to himself. " _God,_ I need something to bring me up."

"Hi."

"HOLY FU-" Ethan jumped so fast that he pumped his head on the car ceiling. His phone flung off his hand, and somehow his seatbelt ended up constricting his left arm. He frantically turned to see who the _active fuck_ decided to pop up on his front passenger seat. " _WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT_?"

"Ethan, you're in your car and the windows are up." Zamasu calmly, and smugly like an asshole, raised his finger. "Use your inside voice."

"Zamasu- Listen, man, you _know_ how frightful I am." Ethan rightened his sitting position so that he didn't look like he had a bone problem. "Don't scare me like that… why are you here?"

"You looked upset." Zamasu said. "And I was flying by so I can see how a person I know has been doing."

"...Oh." Ethan blinked like twice. Do green alien gods do this on the regular? "That's… considerate of you, I guess? Who is this person?"

Zamasu just realized that Ethan was cured of his _Umm_ Syndrome. _He's growing quite fast_.

He was about to answer that question when Ethan's phone suddenly started to ring. The admin raised a finger before looking down to answer it; again, Zamasu found it amusing how confident Ethan seems to be now.

"Yeah, Terry." Ethan said with a tiny smile. "What's up?"

 _How coincidental…_ "That's the person."

"What?" Ethan blinked at Zamasu. Zamasu pointed to his phone.

"I wanted to know how Terry was doing." Zamasu explained. Was it him, or is everyone somewhat interconnected in a sense? It's becoming more and more apparent over the month. "How is he?"

Ethan raised a brow, and blinked for a long time. "You really _do_ know everybody…"

"Who are you talking to?" Since Terry couldn't pick up Zamasu's voice, he had to ask Ethan.

"This guy named Zamasu wants to know if you're okay."

"This _God._ " Zamasu corrected him, and Ethan shot him a cross look that made the Kaioshin chuckle.

"Oh! I haven't heard from him in a long time!" Terry smiled, Zamasu can _feel_ that smile over the phone. "I'm good, I'm good. Recently got out of those stitches, but I'm alright nonetheless."

Zamasu smiled. "Good."

Ethan went back to the phone. "How come you're calling me right now?"

Terry leaned back in his chair. "Break."

" _Oh._ "

"Yup."

Zamasu leaned over a bit. "Terry, you aren't having anyone in particular harass you anymore right?"

"Nope." Terry shook his head. "Ironically enough, it stopped after I decided to cut Rebecca off."

Zamasu blinked. "You two aren't associated anymore?"

"Not at all. She just went MIA on me after that whole incident." Terry said. "You both know what I'm talking about."

Ethan chuckled. "At least you have the privilege of doing that…" Zamasu furrowed a brow.

"Yeah… don't make me feel bad, Ethan. I swear." Terry chuckled. There was a sliver of a pause before he spoke up again. "Ah, my break is over. It was nice talking with you, Zamasu, and Ethan… hope you get out of that 'contract'."

Ethan shook his head with a chuckle. That chuckle sounded bitter. " _I hope I do_. Peace man, see you later." He ended the call, and looked at Zamasu. "What?"

"What contract?" Zamasu knew that particular wording wasn't literal, and he'll pretend like he didn't figure out it had something to do with his girlfriend.

"My…" Ethan placed his phone on the drink stand. "My girlfriend and I got into an argument. She's manipulative, and only cares about herself, and also has a dad who has connections in the criminal justice system." Ethan shook his head. "I'm walking on eggshells with her and my temper. If I don't be careful, I can get fined, sued or jailed for doing anything to her."

"Gross."

Zamasu's out-of-nowhere response made Ethan laugh. "I know right? I can't really break up with her because of that, it's just… it's a hot mess."

"I reckon it is." Zamasu shook his head. It was sad to hear that Ethan had fallen prey to the plight of a woman who can get her way around. "Aren't you acquainted with Chandler?"

Ethan blinked. "Yes?"

Now Zamasu had to straight face. " _You have a supercomputer being and a trillionaire behind your back_."

"... You're right." Ethan had realized what Zamasu was getting at before the Kaioshin even said it. "Well I mean, I know Chandler knows the FPICA boss guy-"

"So do I."

" _Okay, dammit,_ you _two_ know the dude. Geez, too many connections do you even…"

Zamasu straight up laughed. Ethan, when he was aggravated, looked and sounded funny. "Just saying."

"Well, okay, but-"

"If something like that happens, do not be afraid to call upon him." Zamasu shrugged. "Simple. If she thinks she can manipulate the court of law, then she's wrong."

Ethan smiled. " _Yeah_."

"Don't say ' _yeah_ ' like that, Ethan." Zamasu narrowed his eyes. "You have advantages in this situation; _use_ them."

Ethan looked down thoughtfully, before facing the God again. "Thanks." He earned a nod from Zamasu. "I'ma have to go to work soon by the way so… you kinda gotta _skiddadle_."

"Has Chandler been that much of an influence on you?" Zamasu smirked, making Ethan place his hands on his hips. "I'll take my leave. Keep in mind of what I said, Ethan."

"I will, I will." Ethan said, watching Zamasu hocus pocus himself out of his own car. He looked down with a huge amount of motivation. " _I definitely will…_ "

 **T_T_T_T_T_T_T**

As a means of not rectifying her current situation, Irene had refused to go out with the rest of the guys when they wanted to go for bowling because James was going. She masked the reasoning by saying that she simply didn't like bowling, which was reasonable because she never _did_ bowl, and decided to stay in the suite.

Apparently, Lexi left her phone since she wasn't going to be out for long. She and Jay had spent the night together, and Jay woke up feeling _springier_ than usual, we all know what _that_ means. Sometime soon after everyone had left, it had rang and Irene had to pick it up.

"Hello?"

She didn't realize that call ID was _HotGold._ "Lexi?"

Her stomach flipped. "A-Ambrose?" She quickly set her own phone down and sat up. "Uh, hi! How are you?"

"Ah, Irene." Ambrose said. Her name sounded _real nice_ trailing off of his tongue. "How are you? I'll assume that Lexi left her phone with you."

Within three days, Ambrose had gotten well acquainted with pretty much everyone aside from Rebecca and James, so he was mostly informal now. "Yeah, she did. She went out, but she'll be back soon."

"Really?" Ambrose blinked. "She told me to meet her at your suite."

"I'm the only one here though." Irene blinked. "Ya might wanna wait."

Ambrose made a sound that didn't agree with her suggestion. "I can't… Because I was doing something and I apparently finished a little too early, so…" he paused, "Now I'm walking up to the door."

"W-What?" Irene didn't mean to stutter, but she sure as hell wasn't going to let Ambrose just _wait outside_ for the model. She booked her way to the door, and opened it just in time to see the golden tanned man with his finger right by the bell.

"Oh." Ambrose blinked, and then did that dorky smile that he does when something unexpected happens.

"You can wait in here! Don't worry, man." Irene quickly gestured him in, and Ambrose kindly took her invitation with a slight bow. He's cute. "Are you thirsty? Do you need anything to drink? Are you hungry or anything?"

Ambrose turned around with a look after hanging his navy blue trench coat on the available hanger. "Now why are _you_ the one worrying about _me_?"

Irene gestured to herself. "I'm just _asking_ , you know… get you all nice and settled in here."

He chuckled. "I'm fine, really." He took his shoes off, she took a moment to look at his attire. His hair was in a sweet big bun, and he had a pair of well fitted black jeans with a burgundy sweater that suited his toned, slender barrel chest build. "You look really anxious, please sit."

"Okay." Irene took a breath, she sat back down on her seat. "You look nice."

He gave her a really charming smile. "Thanks." Once he had sat down on the chair adjacent to her seat, Irene folded her hands. She couldn't stop bouncing her right leg.

The richest man in the world is sitting _right in front of her_. Sure her composure was better the first time she saw him, but they're _alone_.

"So how've you spent your days here?" Irene leaned forward, her leg still bouncing.

"I've been walking around." Ambrose leaned back and rested his right calf on his left knee. That sitting pose looked real sexy on him. "I have a habit of forgetting to drive."

"Really?"

"Yup, I'm just so used to walking around everywhere." He shrugged. "It's therapeutic."

She suddenly appeared to relax around him. "Tell me about it, I need to take part in that one day."

He gave her a calculating look for half bath second. "You _need_ to."

She narrowed her eyes. "Whaddaya mean by that?"

"You look all anxious and stuff, still." Ambrose was quick to point out the major flaw in her person over the past week.

But she denied it. "I'm not anxious! Look at me, I'm leaning back and shit." She leaned back, completely relaxed her arms and legs in her sitting position, giving him the calmest face she had.

Or at least could _muster_ , because now he had that calculating look on his face again with a slight smirk. "You're trying too hard."

"No I'm not."

"Yes you are." He firmly said, and they continued having this weird staring contest before Irene finally caved in to those golden eyes.

" _Fine_ , you're sorta right." She shrugged her arms. "This vacation hasn't... gone off to a good start."

Ambrose frowned. "Why so?"

"I got into an argument with umm… my boyfriend." Irene said. "James." She looked down at the ground. "He cheated on me."

Now, Ambrose looked _really_ surprised. "He did?" Irene nodded, but she frowned too; why would _he_ look surprised for? "With who?"

"I don't know." She said. Ambrose blinked. "But… okay, here's the whole story," she gave him a brief synopsis on behalf of the situation; James went out with the guys to some party as far as she knew, the guys swore he didn't cheat on her _as far as she knew_ , and with every sentence she couldn't help but make the man seem more vilifying than he was, deriving from the thing she and Rebecca have told each other about him.

"But yeah I mean…" Irene sat down, the jittery feeling she was getting in her abdomen started to subside. "We fought about it like almost a week ago. I know you know we're together, and stuff…" Irene slightly chuckled. Ambrose kept silent. "And like- okay." She sat up straighter, at least to bring back some confidence in what she was saying. She seemed to deflate every time she insulted James. "So I found this one picture online of him kissing another woman at Tatch. And he comes in and thinks he can just hug me, after straight up putting his lips on another woman?!" She was getting heated again. Irene gave Ambrose a glance, his calm demeanor made her simmer down.

"And he tried to justify it by saying that it was an accident; how do you _accidentally_ kiss someone?" She shook her head, her curls dangling from the action. "Ugh, I just couldn't with him from then on. I can't… look at him the same way, you know. It's just…"

"Irene."

She looked up at him quickly the second he said her name, it rolled off his tongue quaintly. Ambrose had a tiny smile on his face. "Do you not know how hot your boyfriend is?"

That unexpected question made Irene raspberry into a tiny laugh.

Ambrose was being jokeful. "To have some random woman, who is a fan of his, pull _him_ into some kiss is something that is more likely to happen than you _think_ , you know."

"Well I mean..." Irene, despite now being a bit toned down due to his playfulness, can't help but see James in a negative light. "He should know better."

"He more than likely did." Irene frowned at Ambrose. He leaned forward a bit out of his side reclining position. "James looks like a sweet man, Irene. You have Zamasu, Adrian, Jay, and Shona to account for his actions. If they all say he hasn't done it, all four of them, chances are he hasn't. Factor in his stature, and who he is, and you have a recipe for major… fangirlism." Ambrose scratched the back of his head. "I dunno if that's a word."

Irene chuckled. "Well, _now_ it is. Well sure he's famous and all but…" What Ambrose said, when she really thought about James and his real personality, made a lot more sense than what her anger drove her to believe. " _Okay_ but maybe he should have had his guard up!"

"You said he was at some party, right?" Ambrose shrugged. "Unless if they didn't want to be there, what kind of person has their guard up in a party?"

" _But_ -" Irene started getting heated, but this time in a less aggressive way because she was cracking a smile. "But he's a _big guy_ , how could some little woman pull him in like that?! James knows that he did it on purpose!"

"How so?"

She paused, that question was unexpected. "Because he does, he came in here, right _there_ ," she pointed at the spot James was in, "looking all shocked and sad and shit before and when I slapped him."

"Well, maybe it's because you slapped him."

"I slapped him because he cheated on me."

"Anyone would look shocked after getting slapped." Ambrose blinked. "Him being sad was probably just him feeling bad about what had happened. If he were to cheat, he wouldn't have felt that way until after he was caught; from what you told me, you slapped him before he knew that you were going to ask him on behalf of cheating."

Again, he absolutely floored her with his logic. Irene deflated, but then brought herself up again when he smiled. " _But_ like-"

"Are you looking for reasons to be upset?"

" _Look_!" Irene slapped her hands against her thighs, even though she was now smiling because of this man's damned energy. She even moved over to where he was to articulate better. "It's not like he got stupid drunk or anything, he wanted to distance himself from me. So _obviously_ , as a girlfriend, I would get concerned and angry if I find that my man is kissing another girl."

"Have you tried asking him about what happened?" Ambrose tilted his head. "Something tells me that you went off from an assumption, James is famous, famous people get into the craziest things."

Irene narrowed her eyes at him, not answering his question because she herself never waited for his side of the story. So she answered his question with a question. "Are you on his side because he's a man?"

Ambrose raised his brows. "Oh no, not at all." He shook his head. "From the two-something days I spent getting to know you all, I can tell that James isn't the type of man to cheat on his own. You must know much more than I do because you're actually dating him."

James… was never the type of man to do a woman dirty, at _all_. Irene looked down, she didn't have anything else to validate why she slapped and punched him, and broke his phone in two as well, we don't talk about that. James had profusely apologized, she remembered, but she wasn't listening to the apologies. She was only seeing a traitor and a liar… by what assumption?

 _ **Only**_ hers.

She didn't like being wrong, so she sat up again, trying to argue with this super-genius multi-trillionaire. "But he did it-"

"If you can't find a reason to be angry at him," Ambrose smiled, "then you shouldn't be _angryyy_."

He said the last part in a sing-song tune, and Irene pouted at him. She couldn't argue anymore. " _Fine_ , you win."

Ambrose raised his hands. "It's not about winning here, Irene."

"Well, you _rationalized_ better than I did." Irene crossed her arms stubbornly.

"I just want you to figure out what's right for both sides, if you both are still together, that is." Ambrose took a moment to see a notification that came up on his phone before putting his phone back in his pocket. Irene watched him, and realized that Lexi was not lying; he _was_ hot.

And he was also kind enough to sit here and listen to what she did out of anger, and instead of pinning either her or James down, he just wanted her to make sense of the situation rather than abscond from it. That was sweet.

That was _genius_ , as to how he smoothly swayed her the way he did.

"...thanks."

Ambrose looked at her after a long pause, she was shying away from him. "Don't be afraid to be wrong, if that's why you're all flustered over there."

"Excuse you." Irene rolled her neck sassily. "I wasn't wrong."

"Then what were you?"

His playful smile was so cute and attractive. "...not right."

Ambrose raised a finger as he was standing, and tapped her nose. " _Wrong._ "

The weird butterflies came back again because the richest man in the world just touched her fucking _nose._

" _Okay okay_ , so maybe I was a little irrational." Irene said. "Don't give me that look."

"That is an understatement." He went towards the kitchen, watching as Irene got up and skipped her way in as well.

"Maybe _very irritational, geez._ " Irene sighed. "So… what should I do?"

Ambrose leaned against the countertop. "What do good relationships require, Irene?"

Can he stop saying her name? It sounds hella sexy when he says it. "Uhh…" It didn't take her long to answer. "Trust?"

"If you don't trust him, why be with him?" Ambrose asked. "If you feel that he is really a bad man, and has truly done you wrong… What is stopping you from ending it?"

That made her think; she's been feeling like a piece of her was missing, and even though she may have low-key been flirting with Ambrose prior to this day, she still felt a little hollow. Of course, if she wanted to, she could end the relationship between the both of them, but now that she's been pushed to actually _look_ back at her actions, that doesn't seem right at all. And Ambrose wasn't asking that to encourage her to break up, he wanted her to really factor in her boyfriend's persona for this one.

Here was an off note: Rebecca didn't actually do what Ambrose did. She had perpetuated Irene to keep hating her boyfriend.

"Well…" Irene traced circles into the countertop.

"Talk to him."

She looked up at Ambrose when he gave the _simplest fucking_ way to solve any damn conflict. "Talk to him?"

He nodded. "Mmhmm."

"But… what if he's mad at me?"

"He'll understand." Ambrose said. "I'm sure that's something that he probably _wants_ you to do, too."

She giggled a little, looking down at the ground. Irene crossed her arms and smiled. 'You're so understanding." She shook her head. "You just came in and dissected everything even though you weren't here." She went to get a bottle of mango juice. "You want?"

Ambrose shook his head. "It was made clear that you didn't wait to hear him out." He kicked his foot out softly. "If things work, then that's good. If they don't, then don't wish any harm upon him."

"Right…" She looked up at him. "Can I get a hug?"

Ambrose furrowed a brow at her. "Why?'

"You look soft."

"That's a weird compliment."

"I dunno, I just feel all warm now." Irene said, though she held her arms out. Ambrose shrugged, knowing that it wouldn't hurt anyone, and he hugged her. Irene almost _sunk_ into his embrace; he had this warm… feeling, like the kind that would let you know that this person had a warm and big heart. And he _smelled good_ too, not like cologne but of some distinct citrus scent, and his sweater was soft…

She almost forgot his retardedly incredible amount of wealth in the five seconds she had hugged him.

She was reluctant to let go, but did so once he had eased off of her. Ambrose gave her a tiny smirk. "Feel better now?"

"Lots." Irene smiled. "I kinda want him to come back now." She scratched the back of her head. "I kinda missed holding him."

A blink. "How long has it been again?"

"Only like a week- but still!" Irene clasped her arms against her thighs. Ambrose chuckled. "That's a lot of time for a couple, okay?"

He nodded. "Understandable." The engineer stood straight from leaning on the countertop. "I'm sure things will go well between you two instantly."

Irene frowned. " _Instantly?"_

He did that thing where he would nod and his bun would move with him. "Yup." Just then, the two heard the front door opening. Lexi, James, and Jay entered the suite talking with one another, and Ambrose was the first of the two to walk out of the kitchen to greet them.

Jay almost dropped everything he had in his hand which… was his phone, before greeting Ambrose kindly. Lexi gasped and started approaching him fretfully. "I'm so sorry, Ambrose, I didn't know you would be done so quickly! I didn't mean to hold you u-"

" _Lexi,_ " Ambrose raised both hands, reassuring Jay's girlfriend, "It's fine; you didn't know."

Because Ambrose had purposely decided to approach the trio faster, all the attention was diverted from Irene who had exited after he did. He knew that the both of them exiting together would be needlessly suspicious.

Lexi exhaled a bit. "Alright, alright. I was just saying, like I could've-"

He started to chuckle. "It's _fine_. How are the three of you?"

"We're fine." James said, not really wanting to engage in anything with the geek in front of him. He didn't particularly sit well with geeks. "I gotta go freshen up, so Lexi, all fairs to you." He gestured to the model as he waltzed off. At this time, Irene had went back in the kitchen to 'retrieve something', so James and the others didn't get to see her. She could've been her normal, bravado self and straight up greet them kindly, but lately she's been feeling more reserved, Ambrose having picked out that it was her insecurity over her relationship.

Jay looked at the trillionaire, and his girlfriend. "You two go have fun, I gotta sleep and shit." Jay said, cracking his knuckles.

An unspoken gesture that he made, especially towards Lexi. If Adrian were here, he would _know_ what Jay's seemingly laissez-faire statement really meant.

"Very well." Ambrose kind of giggled, and Jay found it hard for him to crack his knuckles even more: that chuckle sounded beautiful to him. "I'll make sure this one doesn't fall again."

He was referring to the model and the last time they hung out. Lexi threw a look at him. "I didn't _fall_ ; I didn't know there was another stair, so I _stumbled._ "

"Next time, don't look at your phone." The engineer walked away from Lexi and towards Jay. He gave Jay a kind pat on the back and told him 'take it easy, I'll see you around'.

Ambrose knew that the reason she 's _tumbled'_ was because she was staring at him while he was speaking. He'd rather just blame it on her phone, she's on it at least forty eight times as much as he was.

Jay gave them a wave, almost certain that the engineer _probably_ caught drift of what his gestures mean. Taking it easy is no problem, and he knew that for sure. Nothing could convince him that Ambrose had ill will towards him and Lexi's relationship, for the most part the man himself kept his hands off of her.

Their relationship, anyway, was stronger than a _simple insinuation_.

He nearly jumped seeing Irene pop right out of the kitchen. "Oh shit. Hi."

She gave him a wave back, and then started going for the stairs. Jay and her have… fallen off for quite a while. While the producer was grabbing his jacket, she turned back to him. "Do you know what James is doing after his shower."

"Uh I dunno, sleep or something else." He shrugged, but then paused and turned back at her. "Why ask?"

"I wanna talk to him."

His eyebrows raised as if showing almost a _mock_ expression of shock. "Really?" His expression read something along the lines of _after all this damn time?_

Irene nodded. Jay blinked, it's been a week since she had communicated (through yelling) with James. Compared to her shitty outburst -he would call it- she was _quieter_ than ever. Maybe part of that was due to her being with Rebecca more.

Women tend to mimic each other a lot.

As quietly as she showed herself, she went up the stairs to her room for a moment just to act like she was doing something. Even though Ambrose made this seem as easy as _123_ , she still felt nervous because literally _everyone_ save for Rebecca detracted from her in general. Not that they hate her but… she just acted in a way that made them question who she really was.

She sighed. Hopefully, all goes well.

 **00010010001001**

James was busy texting on his phone. Earlier today, he had went to the same forsaken bar to talk with B.A, she had given him her number, and the two were now talking with one another since she was at a meeting.

Again, what that meeting was was _none_ of James' business. And for the _better._

She told him, in a jokey manner, that it would not take long before their relationship would start up again. B.A. had told him verbatim: _"Look, she got mad at you and didn't even hear you out. Watch, you both are gonna make up and fuck, just you wait"_.

She had a very liberal way of talking. He liked that.

So now, he had left off with a question about something knowing she wouldn't reply for a while. There were five knocks on his door, and James raised a brow.

"It's open!"

The door _slowly_ opened, like at _turtle's pace_ slow. Once he saw Irene peek her head in, he grew quiet. She stepped fully into the room, both hands fidgeting a bit as she looked at her boyfriend's hot ass face.

Ambrose wasn't fucking lying now that _she_ thought about it.

"Hey." Was all she could muster. There was a pause, since he didn't say anything, he just waved lazily since he was on his bed. "Can I talk to you?"

James raised a brow, not particularly angry at her. He was mostly impartial. "About what?"

She fought internally a little to get the right words out. Gosh, _this_ part, actually _starting_ this, was difficult. "About what I did and said before. I was acting horribly, and… just didn't take into account to trust you since we've been apart for so long. I was an idiot, I'm just… I'm sorry."

She expected James to pull a Jay on her, where he'd either tune her out or stare at her with cold, and calculating eyes. But her head was down and elsewhere as she spoke up until she looked him in the eyes. He wasn't looking disinterested…

That smile on his face just _grew_ with every word she spoke.

"You know I've been _waiting_ to hear you say something like that to me." James sat up, and everything in Irene had _relaxed_ since then. James raised his whole arm to beckon her. "Eh, get over here."

She couldn't help the dumb smile on her face. She went and fell into his outstretched arm. "I thought you would be upset."

James was about to say something but then paused before speaking up again. "I was, I really was absolutely pissed that you would think of me the way you did. But like…" James shrugged. "I mean, Zamasu said it best; you were just angry. And I could understand that; all you saw was the picture itself. Honestly…" he brought her closer, "I could just be petty and stay mad but, it would make me happier if you and I came to better terms instead. So no, _hell_ no I wouldn't be upset at you for apologizing."

She laughed a bit. "Thank you… I mean, to be fair, I didn't just up and do this onmy own, really."

"What, did Ashley talk you into it?"

"Not even." She shook her head. "Ashley had been out with Adrian, but when Ambrose came in I guess I kinda… needed to vent." She twiddled her fingers into his. "He encouraged me to talk to you, since I've been kinda scared to do so."

"Ambrose?" James blinked, he would _not_ have expected the trillionaire to give an ear to her problems. "You told _him_ everything?"

"Pretty much." Irene said, and then she sat up. "I didn't yell at him or anything, don't worry." _More like I couldn't_.

James looked away, surprised. "I… would not have seen that coming."

"I know you don't like _geeks_ and shit." Irene gave him a look before laying back down on his chest. "But Ambrose is a really kind guy, like… he's just full of positivity. You should really get to know him."

That made him build the tiniest bit of respect in the engineer at least. It's not like he hated him, it's just that he never really thought of Ambrose as a social person due to _how much shit_ he does. He figured this guy would stay sheltered in his home for weeks on end or something. But, with a face like that, James thought, that would be highly unlikely.

Most geeks aren't even physically fit. Ambrose's physique is impeccable.

"Sure, sure, I guess I might like… one day." James shrugged. "But first, I'd like to lay here with you."

"Cheesy."

"You know, I'm making an _effort_ ," James articulated as if he was actually doing something _other_ than laying down on his bed, "to make things romantic between the both of us since it's been forever, so don't call that cheesy; it wasn't."

"It _was_." She giggled. "I loved it though." She looked at him, big brown eyes on hazel.

James felt the region beneath his lower abdomen stir. There was a pause before Irene spoke again."I missed this."

" _Just_ this?"

"Nooo…" Irene moved to sit down on top of him. "This too…" She kissed him on the lips. "And this…" She had pulled him away only to kiss him again, but this time her hands wentwent right under the cook fabric of his shirt. That tension in his lower groin was increasing...

 _Welp_ , that suggestion B.A. made earlier sounded like a _plausible_ happening.

She stopped though, he was almost pouty that her hand no longer traced shapes against his pecs. "Do you forgive me?"

James looked into those big brown eyes, her frame was tiny when compared to his. Her hair was in a messy bun, and she had this disheveled romper on, revealing a bit of her black lace bra. The expression she gave him was cute… and coy...

 _Ooh_ , he is _so_ gonna fuck her tonight.

James pulled her in for a deeper kiss, her inviting body language allowed him to slip a finger or two against the front clasps of her bra, undoing it with ease. Their foreheads touched, and he handled her hips dominantly. "Of course I do…"

 **…|...|...|...|...|...**

Luckily for everyone else, the rooms weren't _that_ adjacent to one another, so any sound coming from one room would not bleed into another. With that being said, Zamasu should be _lucky_ that he wasn't at the suite that night.

 _He_ would have definitely heard Irene's needy mewls and cries. That for now, would have made his ears bleed.

He was elsewhere, we'll get to him later.

"Irene…" Adrian took to noticing the artist, who came downstairs after everyone else. James, standing right beside him, had told him and Jay that he and Irene did indeed make up. That was all he could say before the three guys saw her stroll into the room… "Why are you walking funnily?"

Jay shot a _real smug_ smile at James, who held his held high with a smirk. Irene gave the two peeping-ass-tom's a cross look before going to her boyfriend and embracing him.

James gave the producers a goofy smile. "Everything is _peachy_."

Adrian snorted. "I can tell. G'morning, 'Rene."

She looked at Adrian and Jay. "You guys aren't mad either?"

"It was awkward having you two in the same place." Jay shrugged. "We kind were just waiting for you two to make up."

"Are you guys serious?" Irene blinked.

His curly haired friend nodded. "Mm-hmm, we just winded up our pendulums and waited patiently."

She bopped Adrian's forehead. The three had tiny conversations up until Rebecca had came around. Irene saw her before she did, so she ran out to give her unsuspecting best friend a hug. "BECCA!"

"Wh-" Rebecca didn't realize Irene was damn near sprinting towards her, but she recoiled when she was quickly embraced by her friend. "Irene! Geez, you're so springy today!" The red haired woman giggled a bit, smiling brightly seeing that Irene was actually happy. "What happened? You got inspiration for something again?"

" _Inspiration_ would be an overstatement." Irene hopped on both her heels. "It's just something that happened last night."

Rebecca raised a red brow. "What happened?"

Irene's smile got much bigger. "Me and James made up." She turned to point to the kitchen entrance. "They're in there, and I was just talking with them. He explained himself, we compromised and he forgave me for being irrational. That's why I got a spring in my step."

It suddenly took _everything_ , every _controlled thought_ and _muscle,_ to keep Rebecca's smile from turning into a grimace. Her voice wasn't as bright as it was, but she still mimicked a guise of surprise. "Really?"

Irene nodded jubilantly. "I kinda… couldn't come up to him, so Ambrose gave me some advice and welp… we're back together now!" She patted her best friend's shoulder. "We're gonna go out soon, well once Lexi and Ash wake up. We'll probably hit up a breakfast buffet again. Wanna come?"

Beneath the kind, warm and relieved face Rebecca held was a vast sea of boiling anger and hatred. Her fists didn't ball up, if anyone were looking real hard they would notice her pupils contract. She couldn't imagine Ambrose- no wait, she _could_. He can easily manipulate anyone he damn near wants with his money and his pretty damned face. He just made Irene, _Irene_ of all people, dial back on what she's done and made her get back with this cheating man of hers.

She could have sighed; that rich pig _ruined_ _it_.

"'Ey, Irene."

Irene turned around to see Adrian pop out of the kitchen. Adrian fluffed out his low ponytail. " _Let's just say_ that we'll leave without them, friendo. That cool?"

"That's not nice." Irene shook her head. And then her stomach growled loudly. "...Shit, I'm hungry as hell. You know what… We'll go now."

Adrian clasped his hands triumphantly while going 'YESSS!'. Jay walked out of the kitchen shaking his head and pursing his lips. "Fatass."

"Shut up, we're all hungry." Adrian retorted.

Irene laughed at the two, getting back to her friend. "So you wanna come with us?"

Rebecca almost forget that she was asked a question. The doctor blinked at her friend, but reconciled apologetically. "You know, I literally ate beforehand, like way early in the morning, so I'm gonna skimp out on that and just go for a walk."

Irene nodded. "Ohhh okay. I'll catch you later, though!" The guys were already heading out, so Irene quickly told her boyfriend to wait up while she'd go and get dressed.

Meanwhile, the males of this group are literally going in sweats and styled hoodies.

Rebecca watched her friend walk on. She was relieved that getting out of that went well, but funnily enough, she wasn't wearing shoes. At least if she was going to sort out her now _acrimonious_ thoughts, she should at least make it look like she was going _somewhere_ right? The doctor had went upstairs, purposely before Irene would exit her own room. She put on an oversized hoodie, left her leggings on, and a pair of black boots. She _yanked_ her phone from her drawer, and a bluetooth that she started using often, and went back downstairs. Before she even got to the door, she retracted and went by the front window to see if their car was gone. It was, so she decided to leave just then.

The day _right after_ James had kissed that woman, Rebecca went out of her way to call the Tatch web managers to take down that photo quickly, as a way to save face. She _knew_ that deep down, James was taking interest in someone else, and whatever situation he'll end up in was going to end up getting Irene hurt again. And _Ambrose_ just set her up for pain, and failure.

Rebecca shook her head, the slight breeze making her hair move with her. She went right to her phone and contacted one of the private-line numbers that she knew very well. She needed not to worry so much…

Many things, were going to _work_.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Y'all thought Irene was gonna go off and leave unchecked?** _ **Pfft**_ **...**

 **A better question for your brains is… why is Rebecca** _ **upset**_ **about this? As a friend, she should at least notice that Irene has been retracting a bit and should've been happy that this brought her old personality back, albeit better of course. So what is striking her in particular?**

 **Not going to give you the benefit of actual lemon here, ok. I don't do that romance shit.**


	39. Tickled Fancies

**This… is gonna be a juicy chapter…** _ **Oof.**_

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Tickled Fancies**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Somewhere along the days Ambrose had been here, he had shown Zamasu where his suite was. His bedroom was pretty much decked out, as if he had permanently lived there, but the theme contrasted with his actual home. Because he doesn't spend a long time here the room looked very minimalistic, even with with potted and vined plants that either were on shelves or hung over the large windows frame. The color of the room was a kind periwinkle, the floor was a coffee hue carpet that wasn't as soft as Ambrose's home carpet. No, the engineer didn't give him a physical description…

Zamasu was actually heading to the room right now and he did see all that.

The Kaioshin wasn't surprised at the quietness of the entire place; weirdly enough, his tech-savvy abode was _quieter_ than this place. When he walked in, he looked around the natural room, before his eyes caught something he'd never seen before.

There Ambrose was, but he was _actually sleeping_ , and it was about 11 in the afternoon. _That_ is pretty damn late, by the engineer's standards.

Mayhaps he stayed up really late, Zamasu surmised. _Or maybe he's on vacation,_ he surmised _again._ He went closer to the sleeping man, looking at his comfortable and well fit attire. He was mostly clad in dark purple, exposed since he didn't cover himself with his blanket. Ambrose was in a fetal position, and his feet looked _soft to the touch_. The Kaioshin seriously did not know why he had pointed out that particular thing about him first, but they did look really soft.

Zamasu sat on the edge of the bed. Ambrose's hair was scattered over his pillow and the pillow behind him, his hands tucked beneath his pillow and eyes were soft and shut. His _skin_ radiated healthily from the sun rays, he looked… beautiful. It was mesmerizing just to sit there and watch him breathe slowly. Zamasu reached out to touch Ambrose's neck for no reason, and then he did it again, suddenly alarmed by something rather peculiar.

He felt no pulse.

Almost instantly, Zamasu shot up and pressed a gentle hand by Ambrose's heart. For the first _three long seconds_ , he felt _no heartbeat._ When it had came, Zamasu frowned and looked at Ambrose's face. The engineer looked so _calm_ even though his heart, from the looks of it, was beating at barely 20 beats per minute. Zamasu could tell he wasn't in a coma either, maybe his heart was just _that_ healthy.

So with that cleared out, he will now pretend he didn't just freak out because he thought Ambrose was dead.

His eyes went down to his feet. Zamasu had this weird urge to touch them, they were so well pampered and pretty. He moved to sit in front of his soles, raising a hand slowly and placing his finger on one of his ankles. That _only_ action made the engineer lightly giggle in his sleep.

Zamasu raised a brow, all he did was _place_ his finger on his ankle, the heck? So the Shin proceeded to run a small trail down to his soft and smooth feet.

Not even a mere two seconds passed before the engineer unconsciously reacted by kicking his foot out at Zamasu's chest, and sending him to the _wall across from the bed_.

"What the he-!" Zamasu quickly got himself up, he did _not_ expect Ambrose to suddenly be _this_ strong. And when he was _asleep_ too.

The engineer started to stir, the ticklish feeling on his foot waking him up. Golden eyes opened, he sat up to stretch. He paused when he saw Zamasu crouching, and blinked. "This isn't creepy at all…"

Aside from his morning voice sounding extremely sexy, Zamasu glared at him. "Why did you kick me!?"

The engineer blinked, and then looked down at his foot. He felt something touch his foot when he was partially conscious, so he connected the dots quite quickly. "Did you tickle me?"

Zamasu raised a brow and stopped approaching him. "I just touched your foot."

Ambrose did a long blink. "Why did you touch my foot?"

How was Zamasu gonna save himself from seeming a lot creepier than he actually isn't? "It was accidental."

...That actually didn't sound half bad.

Ambrose did that thing where he arched his brow in a way that made _you_ wonder if _he knew_ you were lying or not. "Don't do that, okay? I was asleep, and I'm very ticklish."

Zamash blinked. "Ticklish enough to laugh at someone laying a finger on your foot?"

There was a weirdly sheepish look on his face. He looked adorable. "...Yeah… I have a really sensitive body." Ambrose stood up, now Zamasu could see what he was wearing. It was a dark purple jumpsuit like robe that exposed his chest.

"Why was your heartbeat so slow?"

Ambrose was facing away from him again, so Zamasu couldn't see the slight surprise on his face. "That's my resting heart rate, Zamasu."

A normal, athletic resting heart rate for these humans is around 40 BPM. Ambrose's heart beated once every _three seconds_. "But how? I had to check to see if you weren't in a coma or something."

The engineer turned around, his hair swaying with him. "You got scared because you thought I died or something?"

How the _fuck_ does he know this God so well? " _No,_ I couldn't care less if that happened-"

Zamasu paused because Ambrose rapidly approached him to stare him dead in the eyes. Those magnificent irises were calculating him again, and Ambrose went up to tap Zamasu's nose. "Lying is not good, Zamasu."

Zamasu's eye twitched as Ambrose walked away. "I don't like when people tap my nose."

In a sing-song voice that Zamasu didn't know he would _want_ to hear again, Ambrose had turned around as he walked to his bathroom. " _Sorryyyy."_

Zamasu waited for Ambrose, oh he _waited_ for that handsome man to leave his bathroom just so that he can punish him for being so brazenly confident to tap his dang nose. Once the engineer had stepped _both_ feet out of the bathroom, Zamasu attacked him by poking his side only once.

He seriously did not expect to make the engineer before him _squeal_ and fall to the ground.

"Are you okay?" Zamasu was seriously concerned because… Ambrose's voice went up at _least_ six octaves, he wasn't even sure if that was unpainfully possible with how smooth his voice normally is. Ambrose's smile was wide but his laugh was silent before cascading a bunch of hearty giggles. He positioned himself upwards to look at Zamasu.

"I _told_ you not to tickle me!" Ambrose moved some of his long hair from his face.

"I didn't think you were _that_ ticklish." Zamasu watched the beautiful man get up. "You're really that sensitive?"

" _Yes_!" Ambrose fixed his suit, and then he looked down with a timid look on his face. He fast walked away from Zamasu. "Don't assault me."

Pestering Ambrose like this was _funny_ , so he would head over to Ambrose's kitchen area with the engineer himself and made sure to keep himself behind him. Once Ambrose placed his hand down on the countertop, Zamasu ran a hand up his forearm, which _wasn't exposed,_ and Ambrose swiped that shit away from him.

" _There_ too?"

Ambrose was trying to stifle his giggle. "Zamasu, _please_ ," he held his forearm protectively, "My body is _very_ sensitive."

"That's cute." Zamasu smirked. "It really is."

Golden eyes narrowed at him. "To _you_."

"Not to me, just in general." Zamasu lied. Again, Ambrose did that calculating thing for half a second before brushing it off.

"Fine. I'm gonna go and do some yoga, I'm bored."

Zamasu watched Ambrose walk out of the kitchen, offended. "I'm _right_ here. Am I not entertaining enough?"

"Are you a God or a jester?" Ambrose had to go back to his room to change into something yoga appropriate. Zamasu narrowed his eyes at the male as he disappeared. He took to looking around the area until Ambrose came back. This man knew how to make _any room_ feel homely; the Kaioshin found a bookshelf (or rather, it was right in front of him), picked out a book and sat on one of the cozy sofas, patiently waiting for Ambrose to come along as he read in silence.

 **ㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗㅜㅗ**

Her walk lasted for only half an hour. In that time she had called a few people she knew, as well as the caretaker of her dogs who was none other than her little brother. That particular ordeal only went by smoothly because she opted for him to get paid after she would return from vacation.

In hindsight, she expected Irene to be gone. She also expected Lexi to come to her, and tell her about the fun thing she did without her. The doctor, by default, had always declined her hangouts now, because they _always_ involved something about Ambrose, whether it be him physically there or if she's talking about him. She would also ask Rebecca if she can one day join her and _that man_ instead of just walking alone.

 _Spare_ her the headache, _please._

The last thing she wanted was to be the butt end of the group like always. Everyone aside from Zamasu was paired up, and even the God himself wouldn't spare her a passing glance. It was cute, she thought, but she kind of didn't have much of a place since seven ninths of the group were well involved with one another. What was she gonna talk about, her last patient?

She didn't really feel like talking to Terry. He served his use after a while.

Rebecca plopped her body against her bed, scrolling through the clandestine messages she'd received over the week. This time, the person was talking about some other event that had occurred over at Tycho.

 ***: I'm sure you heard of the last attempt.**

 **Rebecca: Right, was it near the Box, right?**

Rebecca referred to Adrian's house as the 'Box'.

 ***: Too near, like I think less than half a mile away.**

 ***: The bomb itself was only an EMP that would affect electrical charges within about a two mile radius. His stuff is definitely wirejacked.**

 ***: There were some anti-ops who worked on keeping the pressure timer from being sensible from the rest of the police.**

Rebecca sat up at that news.

 **Rebecca: Does the police know about that?**

 ***: Nope, at least not yet. But there are people bringing attention to it**

This was a breakthrough, that only meant one _very dangerous_ case: Adrian's home was heavily hit with the EMP bomb, his house was tech-savvy as well. It would be completely vulnerable to robberies or phishing, at least until the cops get there. This was, for the most part, insider information.

 ***: Now what about the trump?**

They were referring to a plan she had made out. **Rebecca: I couldn't get it to work.**

 ***: Seriously?**

 **Rebecca: yh. Gotta devise something else. It won't take long before I have another idea.**

 ***: ...I can wait.**

 **Rebecca: lol, sure you can. You and I got enough money, you're good.**

She chuckled, why she found entertainment in this conversation was weird. Placing her phone down, she went to her dresser to get something a bit more homely, like… sweatpants and a shirt. So she did, and came back to the person telling her that they needed to go to a meeting.

 **Rebecca: How long?**

 ***: Just a roundup, it ain't gonna take long.** A pause. **A lot of us here are quite strapped in.**

 **Rebecca: You kinda** _ **have**_ **to be.**

 ***: Uhuh. Sending a viable number your way afterwards, delete this one and any directory it gets into.**

Rebecca nodded to herself. She had shut her phone down, and left it alone to go downstairs and eat something. This was gonna be some crazy spec of news...

 **ㅇㅇㅇㅇㅇㅇㅇㅇㅇ**

"That tablet is a bit far away, I think you ought to get it."

Zamasu looked up from his book, and gave Ambrose a look. "Do not order a God around."

Ambrose had his hands in the air, which held his hair loosely letting it spill back down his lower back as he looked at Zamasu with that stupid, captivating smile again. "It wasn't an order, it was a suggestion."

Zamasu looked on at him. He was still in a split position on the yoga mat and was reaching backwards with his neck exposed. The leggings he wore showed just how toned and taut his legs were. His arms and torso were also toned, but his legs take the cake for this one.

And speaking of _cakes_ , although Zamasu didn't know that term yet, Ambrose was in a gymnastic split position right in front of Zamasu, his long hair was brushing his back side as he tilted backwards, and his rear was just as accentuated as his legs were.

Zamasu tightened his grip on the book; the sight was making him uncomfortable. Not because the idea of splits and him being a male, but because… he seriously didn't know why.

Ambrose opened his eyes slowly, bring his upper back up straight. He looked at the Kaioshin, golden eyes pulled a frown from arched eyebrows. "What are you staring at?"

The Kaioshin on the other side of the living room blinked but didn't move his eyes at all. Instead, his head tilting was the only movement from him. "That mat looks weird."

The man's brows raised in _that_ way again, making the Kaioshin second-guess whether or not he knew where his eyes were, but Ambrose then smiled and slowly swung his front leg back. "Weird?" Ambrose looked down. "In what way?" He now was in a pushup position.

"It looks like it's changing color." Zamasu wasn't lying either, the mat was light cyan in some parts, and then a darker shade of green in others, and this hue placement would change.

"It's because of the sun." He bent forward, keeping his arms up to support his shoulders. "If you've noticed, where the sun hits is where it's all light blue and stuff."

Zamasu nodded slowly, and then frowned. "But why?"

"Hnn?" Ambrose's face was towards the ceiling but his eyes were on Zamasu.

"Why would you make it change color?"

If he could shrug properly, the prodigious engineer would have. "I got creative one day."

The Kaioshin blinked. "You get creative very often." So he means to say that he had gotten _creative_ , and just randomly created some color-changing mat to weirdly stretch on? He's only been to this guy's place four times, seeing things like this shouldn't even be that much of a shock. But it was, just because the way Ambrose was.

Ambrose slowly sat up, crossing legs in front of Zamasu, and he nodded in agreement. "Mm-hmm."

The Kaioshin raised a brow, amused. "And what position is this now?"

"Oh, this one is called the 'I'm done'." Ambrose slapped his hands against his thighs as he stood up and off the mat. "Now, I'll go get my tablet."

" _Good,_ I wasn't planning on getting it anyway."

"I know, I know." Ambrose took the tablet in his hands. "You're unreliable."

Zamasu was about to object until he saw that _stupid_ smile on Ambrose's face. He can't get irked at that, god dammit. "Shut up."

Ambrose just giggled, does this man take anything seriously? "You wanna eat something?"

Zamasu decided to let his _bypass_ slide. "Why are you asking me?"

"Because every time I make something, you order me to make it for you."

"Not _all_ the time…"

Ambrose gave him a look.

"Okay, _maybe_ I do so very often." Zamasu admitted. "I find enjoyment in eating what you make."

He also enjoyed eating _with_ Ambrose, the man was as bubbly and warm as the food he expertly makes. That's not something Ambrose needed to know.

As he was whipping up a nice set of breakfast crepes, Ambrose's tablet started to buzz. It was Chandler, the AI left a message of high importance.

 **Not sure if you kept track on behalf of the things going on in the East.**

 **There was an EMP that went off in the Northeast earlier today, and I went with the other Hyperions to scope out the area.**

Ambrose raised both brows. He didn't get any current event update on that particular happening.

"Who was that?"

"Chandler." Ambrose said, while relaying to the AI's message that it was fine for him to hold off on his management. "An EMP went off in East City."

Zamasu raised both eyebrows, suddenly alarmed. " _All_ of East City?"

"No no, the upper northeast." Ambrose shook his head. "Chandler was just sent out to investigate along with the FPICA."

 _Northeast?!_ Adrian's house was in the northeast… "How deep into the northeast did it hit?"

"The bomb itself is tiny." Ambrose went through the back-archives of the current event updater. This was where _he_ could access information _before_ it would be published, this was implanted by Chandler himself. "But its waves stretched on for around five miles. There aren't many houses in that vicinity, so not many people should be affected." The engineer was quick to run down the logistics before fearing anything. Zamasu listened intently. "But there's this one giant dome-like thingy in that region along with a house too. That house was directly in hindshot."

He knew _exactly_ what that place is: That _dome_ was the same training dome that Jay and Adrian owned. Oh shit… "No…" Zamasu stood up suddenly, making Ambrose turn to him. "I _have_ to go see for myself, before telling Jay and Adrian." He briefed once Ambrose raised a brow at the two names. "Those two live in that house."

Ambrose's eyes went wide. "That isn't good. The majority of their electrical appliances would be shut off from the feed itself." The engineer placed his tablet down. "If they lock their house digitally, it would be susceptible to getting robbed."

They _do_ have their house digitally locked. _Crap._ "I'll head there right now to see what was damaged." _Hopefully, nothing was taken either._ Zamasu was about to teleport out of the room when Ambrose turned off his stove.

"Take me with you."

Zamash blinked. "Wait, what?"

"What's the point of inspecting the place if you don't have someone to repair the affected devices?" The engineer smiled at him. He approached and held his hand out to the Kaioshin. "Take me. I'll see what I can do."

Like Zamasu would ever _pass up_ on the idea of rectifying this situation with a help of a supergenius. He took Ambrose's hand, which was soft to the touch. Zamasu and he teleported out of the trillionaire's suite.

The very _first_ thing that Ambrose did when they transmuted in front of Adrian's now dull looking home was rub the area in between his brows; he could _feel_ the electrical imbalances but it wasn't enough to somehow hurt him, Zamasu didn't need to know this. The Kaioshin went forward with Ambrose trailing behind him mentally feeling around the premise. The gate was opened, that was for sure. He went in, and he felt a part of his stomach jolt upwards.

 _The door was open_.

His grave hypothesis was correct. As he stepped in, expecting the worst, what he had saw was even _worse_ than that of what he expected. Everything in the living room was _absolutely ruined_ ; there were glasses and plates dropped on the floor, a large portion of the ground looked like it had been sledgehammered, the couch and sofas were absolutely _finished,_ and his mounted TV was smashed in.

"Those bastards…" Zamasu shook his head in disgust, near uncharacteristic use of language was evaded for now; he was _furious._ Ambrose looked around the living room and frowned deeply. However he wasn't as furious as Zamasu, who knew the producers personally, because he knew that they were at a heavy _advantage_ right now. It looked to him, as he and Zamasu scoped the area, that all they did was _destroy_ everything. No wires were cut, however, and the appliances' power supply's weren't wrested.

Ambrose smirked.

"Why don't you go and do the uhh… the tech stuff, while I fix this place?" Zamasu suggested. He glared when Ambrose giggled at his terminology. "Shush."

"It wouldn't take much energy out of you, would it?" Ambrose asked. Zamasu gave him a look. "...Then I guess not."

The Kaioshin could have chuckled at the way Ambrose turned and went outside, presumably to wherever the 'tech stuff' is. Meanwhile, Zamasu decided to start renovating the living room before moving to the rest of the rooms. They had already scoped out the place, nothing Zamasu knew was stolen but many of the most valuable _and_ expensive items were completely trashed. He raised both hands, a more intense form of energy started radiating from his fingertips as multiple things were being put together. He did start off with the valuables like the couch and TV and the floor, and even some of the special plates that the guys had in their kitchen. Some of the plates were so scattered and broken however, that he couldn't fully put then back without appending pieces to them, but they were small so that wasn't a problem for him.

Not even half a minute into revamping the entire living room _only,_ all the lights and electronics went on.

Zamasu looked around in awe; Just how fast was he able to reverse the EMP's effects? That was what, less than 15 seconds?

Ambrose came skipping back into the living room. "Done."

"...You are something else…" He shook his head, incredulous. "How did you even do that?"

"A bit of data tracing, rerouting, and encrypting." Ambrose nodded. "They _are_ using a carrier that was patented by my company so I didn't have a problem resetting everything."

Ambrose did something else akin to that in order for it to encrypt faster, but it didn't involve him even opening the electrical carrier. That was none of Zamasu's business.

"I don't know what any of that is."

"I know." Ambrose looked all over. While Zamasu spoke to him, there were a myriad of objects flying and mending together by Zamasu's magic. The living room looked a bit less than it did before. "Do you want me to help?"

Zamasu blinked at him. "What can you do to help?"

Zamasu could easily solo this task, and Ambrose knew that. "I can _sweep_ and stuff."

Zamasu cracked a smile. Ambrose always managed to look cute to hi- _in general._ In general. _Get that right_. "Fine. Go ahead and do that. Meanwhile, I'll put everything back together, and we'll be out of here in no time."

And Zamasu is _definitely_ telling the guys about this. They need to know; if _Adrian and Jay_ were going to be targeted, anyone who tried it would their _ass kicked_. And whoever is sending these people for them…

 _Ohh,_ they will get the _worst_ of punishments…

 **[][][][][][][][][]**

If Thomas wasn't being paid two thousand Zent just to watch over his sister's dogs for the next three weeks, he would have _been_ declined this task.

Everyday after school, the highschool freshman would take the bus from school to home, and then his best friend's older brother Chester would pick him up and drop him off at Rebecca's house. Chester Onyx was a cool guy, he is Adrian's older brother who was an accountant.

Him and Adrian go _way back_ , like back when Adrian was in highschool he would teach him the _Way of the Dray_ , as Adrian would call it, and invite little Thomas over for game nights with his boys. When he heard that he and his older sister had broken up, they kinda stopped seeing each other but Chester always kept the little guy updated on his gaming buddy. Another person that would visit was Terry; the gynecologist knew and was cool with Thomas, so he would invite the guy in and ask for advice on dogs (Because his dog care skills are _rudimentary_ at best).

Now, he had just finished taking out the litterfloors for the dogs, _disgusting_ as is. For the most part, it was basically several hours of him not doing much other than marveling at this giant ass house, so on the second day he bought in his console. Now, a full ten days have passed and here he was, sitting down and trying to kill this one damn boss that won't die.

The prick is like Shang Tsung; he just _keeps coming back_ to life.

There was a notifier for any mail that came along, and it beeped in the middle of him trying to get that last damage kill. After a few minutes he paused the game, _groaned_ , and then when to open the door and check the damn mail. When he got to the kiosk, he placed his finger down and it unlocked, revealing a box and a weird vial like thingy on it.

"The hell…" The 15 year old pulled out the box slowly. The vial said that it was for Terry, and that it should be pushed by the person who it is _for_. The box looked really inviting, but why would something for Terry be sent here?

A little part of Thomas freaked out because… that just meant that whoever sent this knew that Terry comes here often. But he did push that aside for now.

He didn't attempt to push the little vial button, he just went back into Rebecca's house and placed it on the floor. He sat down in a criss cross position in front of it, and looked at the taping that was done to keep the top closed. Yup, he'll just open it the conventional way.

Since he didn't have a box cutter, he just grabbed a kitchen knife and sliced at the tape's surface, around the vial, and pulled it open. Weirdly enough, all there was was a sheet of white styrofoam like material covering whatever was beneath it.

"Why would someone send a box _in a box_ to him?" Thomas frowned; _boxception? Mayhaps_. He pulled out the white material, and his jaw dropped to the floor with eyes looking like they'd pop out of his head.

No…

 _No fucking way…_ This can't be what Thomas was seeing; there was a black peculiar looking box inside that was much smaller than the actual white styrofoam shit thing as Thomas would've called it, but it was attached to the vial itself. It had little wires and a light indicator that was currently off, and _rightfully so_ because right now…

Thomas literally had a _bomb_ on his lap.

He couldn't even push it away because like, what if it blew up from the _slightest_ of harsh contact? His heart was beating out of his chest, contrasting with his slow and meticulous movements. If he had pressed the vial, the bomb would have probably been activated or would have even _went off_ , he was _lucky_ that he chose to do this the wrong way. The second he had placed the box gently on the floor, the boy ran to his phone.

And no, he _booked_ his way into the kitchen. He even slid sideways from the cleanness of his socks on the tiled floor, and proceeded to call the police while his stomach was to the ground, keeping a careful eye on the box in the living room.

"Hello?... Y-yes?... No, umm, I-I'm-I just got this thing in the mail for another person…" He shook, getting up and checking to see if it wasn't suddenly activated by being exposed. "...And there's a bomb in there, a-and it-"

The person on the other hand told him to calm down in order to give him the address to this place. He had told him the address, and said that there would be forces on the way, and that Thomas should check to see if it is active.

"...I-I mean it's not blinking," Thomas said, he nodded because the guy said that it was an inactive bomb then, "S-should I take it outside?"

"I wouldn't want you to risk possibly setting it off." The man on the receiver said; Thomas wouldn't risk that either. "Just stay tight, local police forces are heading your way."

"Alright… alright, thank you." Thomas breathed, hanging up the phone, and then turned around to look at his game. He didn't even feel like playing anymore, his stomach was _turning_ uncomfortably. He had to make sure he'd stay right here so that Ollie and Loki, if either of them come downstairs, would not even _bark_ at this dangerous device. He sat on the couch, staring, for ten minutes.

 _Ten long minutes…_ yet the nearest police station was around twenty minutes away. These bluecoats _rushed_ to the scene, knocking on the door and Thomas went to open it quickly. In came at least _four_ forensic IT specialists, he looked out the front wall windows and saw like _eight cop cars_ just sitting inside Rebecca's gate, since he had left it unlocked because why the fuck would he waste time making them enter a damn password over this?

Right now, he could swear this looked like a scene from _Criminal Minds._

Now the actual cops came in; they show him a warrant of course, and asked Thomas if this was all he could recount. He said yes, and they asked how long has it been sitting in the kiosk; it was only there for at least a few minutes, perhaps prior to Thomas hearing the notification ring. The specialist extracted the entire box from the mansion, Ollie and Loki coming and barking out of worry over the commotion, but Thomas reassured the two to calm down. The cops had sent their reports in to the _FPICA_ , and when Thomas heard that he almost shat himself.

This is _big_.

"Terry Wu does not live here, correct?"

Thomas blinked out of the haze. "H-huh? Um, no, no he does not."

"Do you know who he is?"

"Yeah, he and I are cool, he is a coworker and friend of my older sister's."

The cop logged it down. "Alright… I'm sure you may not know this question but: do you know if Terry has been involved in anything sort of criminal activity?"

That made Thomas shake. "U-uhh-"

"On the receiving end. Either or." The cop reinstated.

"I don't… I don't know."

Since that particular tidbit of information was sent out directly to the FPICA after Terry told Mark about it, the local Northern police cops weren't given direct intel of Terry's incident. "No problem." He noticed the look on poor Thomas' face. "Everything's going to be fine, kid. The bomb and the specialists are heading down to the Agency Center for inspection."

The Agency Center is another term for a part of the FPICA building itself. "O-okay."

"We're heading back!" One of his member called out, and the cop looked at him with a tiny smile.

"You're in good hands."

"Thank you." Thomas gave the best smile he could, how his pants weren't wet or packed right now was beyond him. Now he debated on calling either Terry, to tell him what the hell happened, or Chester, to tell him _what the fuck_ happened. He also went on to call Rebecca about this, saying that he legit received a damn bomb that was for Terry in the mail. He called his parents but didn't tell them what happened or anything, he just said that everything was okay right now. He decided to call Terry too finally, to tell him not to worry first before explaining _why_ he shouldn't worry, and the gynecologist told him that many things have happened in the past few months that he shouldn't worry about.

Weirdly enough, Terry sounded _unsurprised_ about the ordeal too.

He wanted to call it quits for now so he can head home and forget this happened. What if someone tries to shoot up the entire house? At the thought of that, he dipped back onto the pad that controlled the gates and _locked_ that shit, like _hell_ he was gonna leave his sister's house open to attacks like this.

 _How about take a safer route and just_ _ **bring**_ _Olz and Lo to my house?_

Thomas snapped his fingers; _yup let's go with that._ He tapped in the number to the accountant and damn near slapped his phone to his ear.

" _Yeahh_ uhhh Chester? … _Change of plans_ , I'm gonna take the dogs home with me instead…"

 **«¤»«¤»«¤»«¤»«¤»«¤»**

"THEY _WHAT?!_ "

The dining room table nearly broke out of its hinges from how hard Jay slammed his fist against its surface. Every plate jumped at least an inch or two in the air, luckily no one had a glass of anything for themselves at least.

Adrian placed a hand on Jay's. He was just as pissed as his best friend, but Jay has been through something similar to this, so it hit him personally. "Bro, calm it please. If Zamasu's telling us then I'm sure he probably whooped their asses on the spot."

"I didn't." Zamasu said, and continued when the fretful looks on both of the guys' faces escalated. "I was told this by Ambrose at the time. The EMP went off way before he got notice of it, so I went to inspect the place."

"You actually went back?" Ashley asked, leaning forward. "Did they rob the place?"

A very foreign, old part of Jay's gut had sunk to the floor hearing that.

"Not at all. All they did was destroy nearly everything." Zamasu felt a twisting sensation when everyone, including both their girlfriends, James and Irene, had grim faces. "I have walked throughout the house and nothing was stolen. Throughout today afternoon I spent much of that time renovating the home."

"Are you serious?" Adrian went wide eyed. "You fixed _everything up?"_

Zamasu nodded. _Now_ everyone was relieved, it was as if the whole room exhaled deeply.

"Leave it to the Z to save the day, guys!" James had a bright toothy grin on his face. "That was real considerate of you, man."

"I wasn't the only one who deserves credit." Zamasu added, regarding James' comment kindly. "If I had went alone to fix everything up, your house would've still been susceptible to being robbed." The Kaioshin sat up abruptly. That was inadvertent. "Ambrose wanted to teleport there with me so he can rework your electrical… tech stuff."

"NO WAY…" Lexi looked at him wide eyed. Pretty much every single one of them did the same fisheyed expression that would've made Zamasu laugh his ass off.

"He _went with you_ and helped?" Jay blinked, shocked. " _The_ Ambrose? _The_ __trillionaire?"

Zamasu chuckled a little. "Yes, he did." The room went silent for a long moment. "He is a lot nicer than you all think."

"I beg to differ, this guy is something else." Adrian shook his head. "Did he like snap his fingers and the electricity started to work again?"

That earned a snort and a chuckle from almost everyone in the room. Unknowingly to Jay, he was _nearly_ right on the money with what Ambrose did.

Zamasu shook his head with a smile. " _I_ have no idea, but not even fifteen seconds into me fixing everything, all the lights went back on."

"He's amazing…" Lexi smiled, thinking quietly.

"I'ma go give him props for that." Jay clasped his hands together. "We have nothing to worry about here."

Of all the happy and relieved individuals in the room, one was masking the angry skepticism on her face. Rebecca had quietly laughed and played along with everyone, all the while texting one of her contacts to call her randomly.

"Becca, you see this?"

Irene called out to her, the doctor looked up momentarily with a smile on her face. "Hmm?"

"What Ambrose did?" The artist smiled brightly. "The man's a sweetheart, ain't he?"

Rebecca nodded. "I bet." Just as she said that, her phone started to ring, which thankfully caught the attention of everyone. "Hold on, I got a call guys. I'll be right back."

She stood up and left the others, making sure to answer the call like normal. Rebecca went up the stairs by _twos_ , she went into her room and closed the door, sighing deeply. "Thanks."

With that, she hung up, and then texted that same person who had faux called her just now. She needed their help to get out of the shitty sap fest going on down there. So what if he helped? It doesn't fucking matter if he did, why are they all so happy about that anyway? Just say that it was a nice _offer_ of his and then be done with it!

 _Ugh._

She looked up at her phone since she was laying down.

 **Rebecca: Thanks for the call. That worked at least.**

A pause, she placed her phone down to take off her hoodie and came back to two messages.

 ***: What do you mean?**

 ***: You mean to tell me that Box op didn't work? How?**

She shook her head, as if she was on the phone with this person.

 **Rebecca: It is not a fault on you guys' behalf, because a person I know already went there. You know, the greenie.**

 ***: The** _ **God**_ **dude went there?! That quick?**

 **Rebecca: Yes... along with Ambrose. So they fixed up everything before your heist team could come in.**

There was a pause. Then the person responded.

 ***: I just got the notification from the others. They couldn't get in the house at all.**

 **Rebecca: Fucking hell…** she placed her phone down, before an idea out of _rash_ _thought_ was breeded. **So… how about Ambrose?**

A _long, pregnant pause_ this time.

 ***: …**

 ***: Do you know how fortified that man is? It would take hundreds of** _ **billions**_ **to place a hit on him, not to mention just going to wherever he lives.**

Rebecca sighed; she _really_ wanted this rich man exposed. She wanted his career to prostate itself to failure, his unrealistic riches to _burn_. She _hated_ him and maybe it would be wise to ask _why_ she hated him.

To be truthful, she has reached a point where she doesn't even know.

 **Rebecca: Right, right. At least not kill him, but mayhaps do something to set alarms off in that head of his.**

 ***: ...You really hate him don't you?**

 **Rebecca:** _ **Yes.**_

 ***: Listen, my team has a lot of expendables, alright? But to go there would be like walking straight into the FPICA building with a gun in hand. Ambrose has** _ **loads**_ **of security around him at all times, and he probably has thousands of ways to pinpoint who did what. He's untouchable.**

That was a great point. Rebecca deflated.

 **Rebecca: Right, right. Just… focus on the small fry for now.**

 ***: Are you gonna have another sabotage issued somewhere?**

 **Rebecca: Nah…** She thought about it for a moment. A smirk slowly made its way to her face as she typed her next response.

 **Rebecca: I'll let the next set up get them. They won't even see it coming…**

"You guys made up?"

" _Yup._ " James nodded, seeing the look on B.A.'s face cascade into laughter. "What?"

"I _told_ you you guys would sucker up before a week's period!" She tossed some of her curly hair back. "What'd'I say?"

"Okay _okay,_ you were right dammit." James chuckled. "I mean- okay, it would be stupid for us to break up especially because I wasn't alone or anything." He shrugged.

"But you _thought_ you two would be done after that." She snapped her fingers. "I remember what you said earlier this week, boy."

"Don't dwell on the past, my friend." James smirked, chuckling as he swung a bit in his stool chair. In the midst of that, he caught a glimpse of some _one_ sitting alone a bit far from where he was. Right in front of a large landscape painting sat Ambrose in a two-person booth; he had his tablet in front of him and looked to be writing and glossing through things in the same way a professional accountant would go through numbers. A thought passed by James; even though he didn't associate with geeks, what Irene told him had been sitting in the back of his mind. Even more so when Zamasu sat them down yesterday and told them that Ambrose even _offered_ to fix their electronics after the EMP had went off. He felt compelled to speak with him.

"Is that…?"

He pointed, looking at Ambrose. B.A. leaned over to see where he was pointing, and when she saw it was at the trillionaire, she felt her heart skip a beat. Even when Ambrose walked in and greeted her kindly, she found it hard to speak with him…

Because she knew him before.

And since she changed her identity, voice, and _most_ of her normal appearance with hair dyes, permanent eye contacts and makeup, he didn't recognize her. Well, _hopefully_ he didn't… the last thing she wanted was for him to know who she was, and instantly remember what she's done to him.

Her gut sank.

"Yeah… yeah, that's him." She giggled. "What, wanna talk with him?"

"For a moment only." James gave her a look. "Why are your cheeks pink? You have a crush on him don't you?"

No, it's because B.A. felt a weird bout of embarrassment, like the kind you feel when you acting like someone that you're are not in front of a long time best friend. "... _maybeeee."_ She lied.

James snorted. "Alright, alright. I won't mention you at all. Totally." The basketball player teased, and she reached out to hit his shoulder. "I'ma go chat with him."

"Does he know you?" B.A. asked. She wiped the counter a bit harder.

James turned. "Not me, but he is good friends with one of my guys." With that, he gave the bartender a wave. As he walked towards Ambrose, the same jock-esque feeling he always had when seeing this guy returned; James was taller, James was bigger, James was more imposing. Physically, James would have felt like he was at a _higher echelon_ when compared to the slender, toned wealthy man sitting with amazing posture and writing his math equations or whatever. But he didn't; Ambrose looked _fruity_ to _him_ at best, yet he didn't feel that sense of dominance over the rich geek.

It was subconsciously bothering him.

When he had reached the supergenius' table, Ambrose was the first to look up at James with a sweet smile. "Good evening, James."

James gave him a crack of a smile. Internally, he pushed away the incoming dominance he urged to assert. "Good evening. Kinda wanna talk to you about something."

Ambrose raised his sharp brows, then he closed his book and moved his tablet and gestured for the basketball player to sit across from him. "Sure. Sit."

James sat, folding his hands on the table. "Irene told me that she spoke with you, about the whole thing that happened." And that kind of irked him as to how Irene could spread their business like that. "You encouraged her to talk with me."

Ambrose's fingernails grazed against the table soundlessly. He shrugged. "She looked apprehensive, and kinda just… spilled it all to me. It was something that was bothering her for a while."

"The incident?"

"That, and not being around you." Golden eyes looked into hazel, James felt the need to sit straighter to look imposing.

He tilted his head. Quite… surprising that another male was able to talk his girlfriend into comprising with him. "That's real kind of you."

Ambrose did this really sheepish smile. "It wasn't much really. She was just afraid to speak with you."

"I know." James laughed a little. "She thought I wouldn't forgive her, but I mean… she got wrongfully angry and didn't know what to say. Anger gets the best of people and stuff."

"Mmhmm." Ambrose smiled. "I hope things are going well with the both of you. You guys are cute."

James snorted. "Oh, things are alright. That same night we made up." The tiniest twinkle in Ambrose's eyes made the smug smirk on James' face grow. "It was nice."

"I bet it was." Ambrose didn't give the bodily response that James was trying to exude. Mayhaps unbeknownst to James, his _need_ to exert dominance over this man was making him around like he was _insinuating_ jealousy out of Ambrose. But Ambrose didn't care, and he was certain that James wasn't purposely trying to come off that way. He tapped a few things on the screen of his tablet, the silence taking over the two even though he felt James' eyes on him.

"Why though?"

He looked up at James. "Why what?"

"I wouldn't bear the thought of this, but Irene is a pretty woman who was in distress." James leaned forward. "Why tell her to go back to me?"

Ambrose literally could have _wrapped_ Irene around his finger with the frustration she felt that evening. James was thinking in retrospect; he could have eased her into _anything_ , Ambrose had the gusto to just fuck her good and take her as his own, but he didn't do any of that. And he didn't pick sides it seems, he just made Irene do that on her own.

The golden eyed man shrugged again, he had an innocent look about him. "Why not?"

James paused. Right then, and right there, he knew to respect Ambrose a bit more than he would have.

There was a pause. He chuckled though, the basketball player leaned back a bit with a tiny smile. "Thanks. For that, and for fixing up Adrian's house."

Ambrose gave him a acknowledging smile. "It's all good."

James had completely forgone the subconscious dominance thing. Instead, he had ordered a drink and decided to sit with the engineer and talk to him, at least get to know him more. Despite the two having completely different interests, it was quite amazing to see how easily Ambrose could bounce things back and forth between them. He was _very_ witty, there were times when James had to straight face because Ambrose would catch him on some of the shit he says.

Overall, it was fun to speak with him. Now he could see why Lexi loved him so much.

Sitting far, _far_ away from the two men was a woman, who had her phone facing their general area. It was an inconspicuous position since to any passerby it looked like she was just reading something off the screen. This same woman was the one who had caught the picture of James kissing another woman a week ago; she had recently got fill from her sidepayer that he and Irene were back together.

Of course, Rebecca wasn't going to let that fly. This was her orchestration after all, she would _not_ let the show fail and collapse on itself.

So the woman snapped a few pictures of the two, especially when Ambrose and James were laughing closely. She would have to save them elsewhere and watch the two over the week until Ambrose left. She wondered just how Rebecca was going to continue this, how the doctor was going to contort Irene's relationship with the sight of these two.

But knowing Rebecca, she may not be the best tactician in hindsight, but she _sure knows_ how to rally everyone up under anger, envy, and hate. Those were the easiest emotions to hold control under, and Zamasu could definitely vouch for that.

Sitting in her bed, Rebecca gotten a message from the woman saying that she caught pictures of… not only James and B.A, but James and _Ambrose_ instead. The doctor raised a brow, didn't James hate this guy too?

Her eye twitched. James would stay far away from geeks like him; They can't be fucking friends already, god dammit.

...Or can they?

Rebecca's grimace gradually turned into a smirk, because now she has _two_ avenues to crush _James._ Ambrose was untouchable, she knew that, but he can be the _asset_ to James' impending misery. All she has to do is keep her hands off Irene and James too, and she'll just let her people do this for her.

 _Now_ she was full on smiling; _this…_ was _such_ an entertaining game...

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Ambrose ain't skipped leg day, huh?**

 **Now, we know that she was the one who set up James to look like a cheater. This is why why those men, who had jumped Terry, said that he should stay away from Rebecca. Oooh, money gives you** _ **hella**_ **connections.**

 **We made it quite far, damn… I did say after 40 I would call it quits on updating here, and make it a complete other fanfic page thing instead.**

 **I have much to do for a while, so I'll make a safe say here to say that after the next chapter, this is a hiatus, like an actual ass one. So…**

 **See you all in the final chapter, kiddos.**


	40. Experiments

**Drop this over here…** _ **oof.**_

 **Had to do it to 'em. The last shiz before the hiatus.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Experiments**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

It won't be long until they would return back to Tycho. Zamasu could have sworn that, despite the amount of stuff he got into, this was probably the _fastest_ three weeks he's ever lived through.

And that's coming from him; this guy is _hundreds of thousands of years old_.

He was unintentionally keeping track of the days left; it was three weeks, so far they had around three or something days until they would supposedly leave. He had a feeling it wouldn't be exactly five, they would either leave earlier than that or _later_ than five days, but his gut told him that it was definitely going to be either one of the two. The entirety of today was the usual; Lexi being with Jay this time, he had no idea what Ambrose was doing, James and Irene being a thing again, Rebecca going back to hermiting for some reason… while Adrian and he took a moment to talk to one another about Zamasu's experiences. It was a way of recounting all that had gone on, allowing him to see everything in full scope while he sipped from a bordeaux glass of golden Amber Rose.

The two men went to a nice hot tub room that was a few floors above the ground, giving them a beautiful view of the winter-like outside. The heat of the room would keep Adrian warm enough, even if there is no window and one of the walls is literally an opening to the view itself. Zamasu slowly lowered himself down into the steaming water, feeling his physical muscles unstress completely. He took a deep breath in and out, and Adrian slowly approached him.

The curly haired man crouched down to the Kaioshin. "How is it?"

"It's fine." Zamasu stretched his arms out to rest against the edge of the jacuzzi. He tilted his head upwards to look at Adrian, already knowing he needed assurance. "It isn't too hot."

"Aight." Adrian nodded and sat against the edge crossing his legs. He lowered a leg down and instantly retracted it with a wince after it made contact with the water. "Dude, you said it wasn't too hot!"

The Kaioshin frowned. "What are you talking about? It's not that hot at all."

Adrian shook his head. "That shit is _scorched_. I think we kinda need to lower the temperature just a little bit. Not everyone in this entire condo is born with strong skin, ya know." He stood up and went to where the jacuzzi's overall controls were. "I'll just lower the temp through this."

"No need for that." Zamasu wasn't wasting any time with needless technology here. He lifted himself up and sat against the edge, raising a hand up in front of the jacuzzi. The water started swirling in the middle of the jacuzzi's surface, gradually going down to the bottom in a whirlpool formation.

"What are you doing?" Adrian raised a brow. "How the _fuck_ are you doing tha-."

There were little formlets of ice that formed on top of the entire surface of the water. The droplets became larger, until they were about the same size of Zamasu's hand. He lowered his hand and the ice droplets were immersed into the heated water, getting mixed in with the heated water due to the whirlpool that Zamasu had created. Several seconds later, the whirlpool ceased itself slowly, and the water became still again.

Zamasu then lowered himself down, and looked back at Adrian. "It should be fine now."

Adrian just stood there blinking and looking as dumbfounded as a guy watching two Mexicans break dance in a bus stop. The producer looked between the jacuzzi and the Kaioshin, and shook his head with raised eyebrows. "You are _extra._ "

"The heck does that mean?" Zamasu furrowed his brows.

"You done created a whirlpool thingy in a jacuzzi and ice just to cool it down. That's extra." Adrian chuckled at Zamasu's glare and lowered himself in as well, noting how hot and comfortable the water was against his skin. "The water feels good…" He looked at Zamasu. "What'd you do with this water?"

Zamasu slowly shrugged. "I just… made it _cooler_?"

"Nah nah, not that. It just genuinely feels nice against my skin." The biracial male turned towards him. He opened his mouth and then closed it, realizing the joke he would make would sound stupid. "I was about to make a joke about holy water, but I decided not to."

Zamasu frowned, and shook his head. "Good thing you did, I would have smacked you if you made such a joke."

"Well geez." Adrian propped his arm against the edge of the jacuzzi. "Does it exist or something?"

"It doesn't exist. It's just humans putting water in a bottle and calling it 'holy'." He shook his head, and Adrian snorted. "Is that not what humans do? Put labels on nearly everything?"

"It is." If Adrian had a cup of tea, he would be sipping it right now. "It's irritating, and kind of divisive." Adrian looked down. "But I guess it's for the sake of organizing."

"Organizing?" Zamasu looked at him. "If labels are for organizing, then why would humans fight each other over them?"

Adrian shrugged, and made a sound. "Maybe some people just... organize _too hard_ , or some shit."

The Kaioshin chuckled and nodded right after. He understood what Adrian meant by that, the man didn't say such a statement for nothing. Zamasu looked down at the water. He and Adrian somehow ended up being the first ones out here (he really didn't know if anyone else other than Adrian has been out here so…), it's a good thing that he wasn't left with Irene. Even though Adrian and she had _many_ things in common, he found Adrian more tolerable, and somewhat funny. It's weird, they both have the same type of humor but he found Adrian to be a bit… better, in a sense.

There were a lot of happenings that were weird to Zamasu, he would have to say learning about how James and Irene got back together was sort of a good thing mayhaps, but it didn't seem so great to him at all. Zamasu may be the biggest _novice_ in romance and stuff like that, but he's not dumb enough to know that the way Irene buzzed at James was peculiar. With the situation quelled, it had him thinking; any _possible_ suspicion would get that woman to start bad mouthing everyone, and James still decided to be with this _child_. Yes, he'll call her a fucking child; she threw a whole tantrum and didn't trust her earnest guy friends _and_ him, knowing damn well he wouldn't lie (he seriously wouldn't, even though he _is_ petty), and now they're back together?

To him, that spells a bit of trouble for James. What if some rabid woman does that again, will Irene's head explode? Zamasu would have chuckled if he saw that, maybe.

Jay had remarked something in regards to that as well, he too felt that James may be walking on eggshells if he continues to date this woman. Since Jay obviously knew more about relationships than Zamasu did, it wasn't surprising that he picked up on that almost instantly. But the producer was happy for James, at least things weren't awkward between the two now. And Adrian too, had raised a bit of suspicion over this, and every time he looked to what Adrian was saying, he can't help but see a reflection of Irene in him.

Well, a more sane and controlled version of her.

In over a quarter of a year, and here Zamasu was, sitting in a luxurious hot tub with another human being who resembled the same person he's hated the second he arrived on Earth. Since when did he figure out that this would happen?

He actually didn't. He didn't know that he would end up spending hours talking with a human woman who makes him second guess how ugly the species was, he didn't know that two dogs would show him more about their owner than said owner would, he didn't know that the same man that tried to fight him ended up becoming well acquainted with him so soon, and he didn't know that he'd find another human being living in _this_ era who embodied what humanity could have been. Zamasu didn't know that within the month of living in Rebecca's house, he would get involved in some of the _stupidest_ situations a Kaioshin could muster: annoying a doctor with shitty puns, accidentally getting high off of edibles, hitting James' head with a spoon, fighting alongside the famous guys against 30 adversaries, and realizing that a menstruating woman isn't as weak as he'd like to think so.

And he didn't think that he would crack even a _chuckle_ at the reminiscence of all those experiences.

"You thinking over there?"

He blinked, seeing Adrian raise a brow at him. Zamasu smiled. "Yes."

"About?"

"Everything." That response made Adrian laugh, and Zamasu had to continue. "There was just… too much that happened ever since I came here. Too many people I've seen."

Adrian shook his head. "Would you have imagined being _right here_ , in less than six months?"

"Not at all..." Zamasu traced circles in the water. A pregnant pause followed suit as he chose his words. "There are things that I'm certain, and things that I am not. As a god, I'm supposed to know what should come next, to make the first move before it goes wrong." He was speaking in a very elusive sense, the magic of creation is not something he can describe very well, he realized. "But… spending time here, in Desna, I really did not know what I was going to get into. I did not think that I would change at all, I thought I would see the same putrid, disgusting things I've seen for thousands of years. I saw a lot of… different things. Beings. Lives. Animals. There is a unique… vibrance in the world you humans are living in."

Adrian stayed silent. Zamasu continued. "This isn't something I'd prognosticate, you would think that as a God I would have intuitively knew this much sooner. I sat right by just watching everything, not using my powers or enacting as much as I do now. These past three weeks in this romantic city," he mean in terms of inspiration, Intima was an alluring place, "have given me time to think and realize that much like you all… I knew nothing."

The Kaioshin seriously did not expect Adrian to fully grasp what he was saying, but the music producer did get the gist of it. And instead, he broke the emotions down lightheartedly. "I think a vacation was all you needed, man."

Zamasu laughed. "Mayhaps. It's actually an interesting thing to realize, that you don't know everything."

"Just gives you more motivation to spend your time knowing, doesn't it?" Adrin smiled.

"It does. Our race revolves around learning." Zamasu said. "We have to study and observe every being in this _entire_ universe. There's septillions of races, we're equipped with the forte of learning about every single one of them. Some act in our favor, and some… don't." He lowered his hand into the water. "I used to admonish a being for acting 'out of line', but now I've been wanting to know _why_ someone does what they do."

A tiny part of him was fighting the urge to say that like them, he also didn't know the answers to anything. He didn't know about this, so he subtly blamed it on him not ever talking about _this_ with anyone, not even Gowasu.

Adrian nodded. "I think it's interesting to see where people come from. At least you get a sense of what they think and what led them to think such a way. Plain ol' psychology."

Zamasu nodded. And then he cracked a smile. "I never really thought you would be this apt in talking about a subject like this."

" _Bro_." Adrian clasped his hands together. "This is something that many people talk about like, late at night when they have nothing else to do and are up during the _Real Hours_ with their friends, man. It's more common than you think."

Zamasu raised a brow. He knew what Real Hours were; it's the times between 3:00 and 5:50 in this planet, dubbed that way because people tend to only engage in the deepest of conversations at this time. "Really?"

"Yup, become friends with someone long enough, and it will _start_." Adrian nodded. "It only brings people closer, to talk about things that make them think."

He was right. He was so damned right.

"No wonder why you, Jay and James are so close."

"Don't forget about Zach." Adrian said. Zamasu almost rolled his eyes at the mention of that singer, they both had this relationship of _fuck you_ that he secretly adored. "He's the _king_ of deep convos."

That probably comes with working at a bar for seven years, since people at bars tend to 'bro up' there the most. "I beg to differ. How has he been doing?"

"Don't you do that thing where you teleport to where a person is?" Adrian furrowed a brow, and Zamasu instantly sat up because _for some odd reason_ the first he thought of was Ambrose since… he does that a lot to him.

"What?"

"Chill down, man." Adrian smirked. "You like to teleport where someone is and stuff."

"Yes, but I don't _know_ where Zachary is. And frankly, I don't do that a lot." _**Bullshit**_.

"Why'd you get so animated then?"

" _Because_ that's a weird thing to do, Adrian!" _No_ , it's because he does it too much and knows it's weird, but still does it anyway.

"Fine fine." Adrian waved his hand. "He's fine though. Probably like… being a studio potato and shit again."

Studio potatoes are basically _productive_ couch potatoes. It makes sense. "Hmmph, unsurprising." Zamasu chuckled. "He's the very definition of _laissez-faire_."

 **{}{}{}{}** - **{}{}{}{}**

Hastened feet lightly made rapid contact with the ground, the first round of sound the man heard was going slamming against the old dirt road only to jump right back up again. Red hair swayed when a head turned around only to jump out of a blast's rays. A huge crater of around twenty feet was made where he was standing.

Zachary landed on the heels of his feet, and looked at the silhouette of an individual who was now expertly balanced on the branch of a tree. He's been on the singer's tail for the past ten minutes, the two had a brawl with no words exchanged. When the dust settled, he heard that smooth, malice-filled voice speak.

"It's been quite a while, _Mr. Tenae_. I haven't seen your face in a month." Shigeru uncrossed his arms. "You think walking around in these woods is safe for you?"

"Do you _own_ these woods, hoe?" Zachary stood up.

Shigeru had a biteback look on his face from Zachary's smart ass. " _Mayhaps_. But people like me could come out from anywhere and end you on sight if you weren't so keen." He didn't waste any time, he crouched and zoomed forward with such speed that the sturdy branch snapped. He punched at Zachary's blocking forearm with a force meant to push the singer back.

Zachary's hair rustled violently as his shoes skidded into the ground at least thirty feets away from the ex-second Champion. "Why the fuck are you here in the first place?"

"Oh you know…" He stood up casually and shrugged. "We kind of need you."

A blink. A frown. "We?"

"You're a strong person, you see. Our syndicate needs those that are distinguishable from the masses in order to reap the best benefits from our scheme." Shigeru closed his eyes. "Of course you aren't exactly _polished_ , but we wouldn't have a problem in 'training' yo-"

"Not happening."

Shigeru could not turn around quick enough as Zachary was _already behind him_. He received a harsh blow to the very middle of his spine, his body went flying before crashing into the ground multiple times. He teleported out of Zachary nearly stomping on his head, his foot breaking the terrain beneath it. Now behind the singer, he swung his knee into the side of Zachary's head, the singer grunted as his back nearly folded against the tree he made contact with.

"You could make this easier, you know." Shigeru opened both his palms, as if trying to negotiate. "You didn't need to resort to violence."

"You _followed_ me down this road." Zachary got up slowly. "I don't expect anything peachy from you after you and your posse attacked us."

"I merely ran into the six of you on behalf of a bounty I needed to get." Shigeru smiled. "I'm sure you guys had figured it out quite soon enough; we were not after you. We were after that basketball player."

Zachary had this creepy shiver run up his spine from that jagged look on Shigeru's face. " _Why_?"

"I already stated why; for a bounty placed by one of your friends."

"What?" Zachary looked down for a moment in thought. Who could _possibly_ place a bounty on James that he knew? Mace was the FPICA _director_ , he has no business doing that. Adrian and Jay were obviously his bestest friends, Shona has a heart of gold, and Kiran doesn't even hold any hate towards James.

"You know what, you probably have no idea of it, since she tends to cut people off from her memory banks a lot." Shigeru blinked before raising his head in fake surprise. "Or have I got the wrong person?"

"Who the fuck are you talking about?! I don't know anybody who would hate James that much. You're shitting on me right now, aren't you?"

"Oh no, it's the truth." Shigeru tilted his head. "For the sake of secrecy, I can't out exactly who it is. It's up to you to figure that one out, but since you turned down my sweet offer to join me, well… prepare to die."

Zachary did not the fastest reflex to see Shigeru quickly lock him against the tree with his forearm, knocking the air out of his lungs and keeping him from being able to breathe. He started gasping for air, but his hands were not under Shigeru's grasp.

"If you think I would let you free from passing up such a sweet offer, then you're _dead_ wrong." Shigeru pressed the forearm into Zachary's neck, the singer could barely make out any words let alone try to regain any breath he lost. He shook, feeling himself get lightheaded from the lack of oxygen after half a minute, but his hands were free. His palms started to heat up, a red pulsing ball started to form. He closed his eyes and allowed the small ball to blow Shigeru completely off of his person, and he fell back to the ground while breathing heavily.

At least three trees fell when Shigeru flew right through them, the dirt around them flying up again as Zachary stood up. He had finally regained his breath and cracked both his knuckles as well as his neck. He could barely make out Shigeru's form in the dust, but that didn't stop him from throwing another red blast into the woods. More debris fell upon the two, one in the opening of the road, and the other still within the lighter parts of the woods.

Silence fell upon the premise, there was no rustling or twigs snapping under any foot. Zachary did not move from where he was, but he listened; he waited for that prick ass voice to fill the void air once again.

And it did, but not without a bone chilling snicker.

"...It's been quite a while since I was hit like this…" _Now_ Zachary can hear Shigeru getting up to his feet. "Don't get too excited over there, the real fight begins… now!"

The last word was said when the dust suddenly dispersed from the speed Shigeru was zooming at him again. This time, Zachary swerved out of the way with Shigeru swinging himself back to kick him in the face. He dodged, his hands then became full with two ki-laced fists. Shigeru moved forward, making Zachary's sneakers dig into the dirt before he kickflipped backwards, hitting Zachary's chin. The singer was airborne momentarily, but he flipped over to get his feet back on the ground. If self defense, and extensive physical training taught him one thing, it's instance of reaction; what to do at the heat of the moment, before you get into some serious trouble.

His defense however, was no match for a man who has great expertise in martial arts, and he knew this. He'd be a fool to pick a full fight with Shigeru; even if his ki blasts could evade the ex-Champion at best, he'd get his ass beat by technique alone.

So Zachary turned around and made a beeline for it. Or _tried to_ , because now Shigeru was throwing ki blasts in his path, making him have to zigzag his path up until one particular blast got way too close to him, and he flew forwards and face planted the dirt. He groaned, he turned around to see Shigeru floating in mid-air, aura calmly oozing out of his body.

"Running away is cowardly in a fight, dear Tenae. Don't be like that, that's _unsatisfying_." He descended, now the shiver has made its way back on Zachary now and he stood up to shoot a blast at the man.

The blast itself was completely nullified with the flick of the man's wrist, now that he is all powered up, and all for murderous intent… "It'll be over before you know it…"

 **{}{}{}{}** - **{}{}{}{}**

"You mind explaining mayhaps why you're still up?"

"I wanted to sleep a few hours ago." James shrugged. "I didn't feel like sleeping anymore."

"Huh…" Jay slowly nodded. It was one in the morning too, but James had earlier said he was much too tired to stay up as he normally does. _Meanwhile_ , here he was on his phone apparently talking to someone and smiling. It sure wasn't Irene, because she asleep right now. "Who you talking to?"

"Hmm?" James looked up from his phone. "Oh, a friend."

"At this late at night?"

"We got into a convo earlier that hasn't ended yet." James said.

Jay shook his head with a chuckle. "Typical." He only woke up to get a glass of water since he was somehow thirsty. "How are things between you and 'Rene?"

"Peachy, as always." Was his quick response, not because he was lying but it was almost instinct to say that. To James, it felt like the start of a broken record because yes, things were nice between them, but the way Irene acted the other day made him wonder if he had to step down from how free he normally was. In fact, the last few times they hung out consisted of her keenly looking at _him_ whenever a female would pass by, and no, Irene never used to do that dumb shit.

He was hers. What did she not understand?

"You sure about that?"

And Jay was _quick_ to point out the way he said his statement. "A little." James placed his phone down and sat up. "She's a lot more uhh… protective now. It's not really a bad thing but it's _kind of_ irritating sometimes."

"It's just insecurity." Jay shrugged. "Give it like a week or something, she won't even bat eyes at anything you do."

"You're right, I've been doing so." James said, another notification came on his phone from the person he was texting.

 **Would you go to sleep now? You're worrying too much.**

 **James: What, you're getting tired of me already?**

 **Ambrose: Not really, you just won't stop worrying :)**

"How the fuck did you get Ambrose's phone number?!"

"Jay, keep your fucking voice down." James gave him a stern look. "We talked to one another at one point and… he was cool, I guess."

"So now you're not hating on geeks anymore?"

"Bitch, I never geeks. I just don't hang with them, excluding you two." He was referring to Jay and Adrian.

"And Ambrose now." Jay smirked smugly. "Y'all got one hell of a conversation going on if you're staying up just to talk to him."

James snorted, as if it was nothing. "It's not anything special."

"But you guys just met."

"Uh- _huh_ , this conversation is fodder though. Don't worry about it." James said, he sent a message.

 **I am not worrying at all.**

 **Ambrose: Yes you are.**

 **James: Why are you up anyway?**

There was a pause. **Ambrose: Math.**

James snorted. **Geek.**

 **Ambrose: This geek's math equations are the ones that will decide your prime rates next month**

 **James: ...wait seriously?**

"James, you know _damn well_ you enjoy talking to him." Jay sipped his glass. "You two would be cute together."

"Unlike _you_ , I'm not bi." James threw him a look. "And I'm not cheating on my girl for a geek either way."

Jay raised his hands. " _Boy_ , take the joke as it is. Geez." Jay shook his head. "I gotta go to bed, I ain't parched anymore. G'night, man."

"Goodnight." James gave Jay a pound, and then he himself yawned. His phone vibrated.

 **Ambrose: Nope. I lied** _ **.**_

James chuckled. **I stand corrected. I'm gonna go sleep now.**

 **Ambrose: Finally**

 **James: Excuse me?**

 **Ambrose: I said finally :). Goodnight**

 **James: Lol, goodnight…** _ **geek**_ **.** He stood up, put his phone in his pocket, and went upstairs to finally sleep. The basketball player plopped on his bed, the silence of everyone else _not_ conscious made it much easier for him to close his eyes and peacefully drift off into the dream world.

 **{}{}{}{}** - **{}{}{}{}**

In a small sector of North City's skies, two blazing rays of energy were shooting across the sky, one much fainter than the other. Just ten minutes ago marked the two men's brawl which started on foot. Now Zachary was full on being taken across the sky, dodging whatever he could but not being able to land a single hit on Shigeru. And this prick is _playing_ with him at this point, he knows the singer is no match for him yet he finds joy in punching and kicking at someone inferior to him.

 _That..._ is straight cowardice. No wonder why this fuck didn't win.

Zachary kissed his own teeth, he grabbed hold of Shigeru's arm and swung him back down against the ground and sent a lazer like blast at where he would make contact. Shigeru teleported from the ground, to a tree, to being right next to the airborne man and attempting to knee him in the abdomen. Zachary held it back, but was pushed upwards by the mere _force_ of the impact. Red hair cascaded in the breeze, he looked down upon and tossed the ex-Champion's hand away before receiving a blow _straight_ to his ribs.

 _Fuck!_ The first thing he felt before the burning sensation was the air being knocked out of him again. The heat was accompanied with a brighter, _redder_ light and a blast that enveloped the entirety of Zachary's body.

Somewhere far away was a cabin-like mansion that was right in front of a beautiful view of the ocean. The long haired, bearded male who was practicing right outside had his eyes closed, but he frowned when he felt and _heard_ a slight disturbance in the air. The superactor turned around, to see two beams of light that were just over a mile away from his home.

Shigeru cackled loudly as Zachary let out a bloodcurdling scream. "It was _foolish from the start…_ to challenge the likes of me."

Zachary went limp, his deadweight body made him descend fast and from the one-hundred something feet they were at, there was no way his already bruised torso would viably survive the incoming impact. He had no energy to support his fall at all~ him hitting the ground would be the end to his consciousness, so he accepted it as is: he lost, to this _piece of shit karate cuckhold_ …

… But he didn't feel any impact. He felt heavy, fast wind that overtook his free hair. He barely opened his eyes and realized that he was back up in the air again, somehow flying _away_ from a red blast that snatched at least an area of a hundred feet of trees and dirt. Now he craned his neck up to see who the hell swooped in to save the day.

"Shona?" Zachary blinked. "Why are you out here?"

The superactor landed on the ground with dainty feet. "My house is a little over a mile away, and I heard loud noises from afar." He smiled. "It was getting annoying."

To benchmark that, Shona heard and saw the two fighting less than a minute ago. Being extremely active and physically superior to the great majority of the population, he flew at around 100 miles per hour.

"I'm sorry man, it's just… _this prick_." Zachary said, he was surprised he could still speak. And then he started coughing, _spoke way too fucking soon_.

"Spare yourself from talking, it'll only make your injuries worse." Shona raised a hand to him before turning back to the floating man around a hundred feet above them. He _deeply grimaced_ while raising his voice to speak. "You mind explaining why you're bothering my friend?"

"I'm not _bothering_ him, dear Shona." Shigeru felt the _murderous_ excitement in him welt into something more sinister, he couldn't keep the sneer off of his face. "I was simply bargaining, and then he started attacking me. I had to do what was _necessary_ and defend myself."

" _Bullshit._ " Coupled with his thick accent and the rising anger in his voice, Shona cursing made Zachary slightly flinch. "Cut it out. I'm _warning_ you to leave this place, _now_."

Shigeru never saw Shona angry, but he sure loved pushing those newfound buttons. "You can't be giving orders to me, Shona. I'm older than you."

"Well you are being immature, picking on those weaker than you." Shona stepped up and Zachary saw this man slightly part his legs. Oh fuck, y'all know when Shona starts getting poised, he's being _serious… Shigeru is gonna get his ass whooped_. "Are you going to do anything to stop me, Mr. _Sacro Judicium_?" Shigeru cackled again while leaning forward. "Don't think I've spent the past year _slacking_ , child. I'm a lot stronger than I once was, so go ahead; come and try to stop me." He closed his eyes proudly. As Shigeru was coming back up from leaning, he didn't see Shona all the way down on the ground anymore.

The superactor was right next to him for a split second before Shigeru felt the _hardest punch he'd received in years_ to his face.

He came crashing down, a crater formed around his body, but he was fucking done yet. A smile creeped its way up his face and the red aura he adorned grew darker. The ground blew apart once he jumped back into the sky to meet Shona's knee on his chin, the wind _whistled_ behind him from the impact. The two started having pure flurries of fists and kicks alike, green and dark crimson red aura swirled and contorted in the heat of their fight.

Abruptly, Shigeru was thrown backwards hundreds of feet, and Shona teleported to elbow him in the back, making him fly forwards a long distance, and then he teleported again and harshly grabbed Shigeru by the collar and swung him to the ground. He hit one tree, and then the ground shattered underneath the speed of his fall.

Zachary watched with hella wide eyes, Shona is _not playing around_.

Shona descended slowly, keeping a keen eye on the area at which Shigeru was, or might as well be buried in. The green around his body did not flare around loosely like Shigeru, it was controlled; it almost acted like a flexing coat around every inch of his body (similar to that of Jiren, for comparison). He shook his head as his feet touched the ground again.

Zachary tried to sit up slowly, but Shona raised a hand to stop him. "I never saw you like this, man."

That really dorky part of Shona came back again and he sheepishly smiled. "I don't like loud noises near my house."

And just like that, the area a hundred something meters behind Shona just _exploded._

Shigeru erupted from the ground up, and he instantly targeted Shona with pure rage. "Don't get your hopes up, _asshole!_ I'm not done with you yet! _"_

"Zachary, do you want me to teleport you to a hospital at least?" Shona turned back to the singer, who was _more terrified_ of that flaring, angry aura.

But… he didn't want to leave at all. "I wanna watch you kick his ass."

Shona chuckled. "Alright, suit yourself." He then turned around, squaring Shigeru with his eyes. He moved a safe distance away from where Zachary was situated and addressed the ex-Champion with vigor. "You want a real fight? You're getting one, then!"

He crouched, and then _jumped_ up to Shigeru. The two went back into their flurry attack barrage, the world beneath them swarmed by the currents from their sheer force. Zachary had to hold his hair from going wild, he watched the bright, long streaks of green and red light rapidly zigzag through the sky, missed blasts violently hit and exploded on the ground.

They both flew apart only to come together again and meet with both their fists colliding. Zachary, who was still on the ground, felt himself being pulled by the wind. He groaned in pain, as much as he _really loves_ this lightshow, the collateral effect of their prowess is going to exacerbate his injuries. "Shona! Please don't forget that my ribs aren't at 100 percent right now!"

Oh, he didn't forget. This will only take a _minute_.

Shigeru tried to counter with another fist to which Shona gripped, making the ex-Champion yelp from the sharp pain in his knuckles. Shona used both his hands to eject a ki-barrier-esque flare between the two, separating them; Shigeru grunted and looked down at both of his hands when he realized… he couldn't feel them…

They were _broken_. The flare _alone_ was strong enough to misalign his wrist bones.

A green light was overhead, all Zachary could see was something akin to a swirling green dwarf in the slightly green tinted sky. Shigeru didn't have time to look up and teleport as Shona's blast was literally _point blank rage_ , and the superactor's irises had a glazed green look about them. "Whatever you and your gang have in store for anyone I know, _scrap it_ , or this will not be the last beating you'll get. That is a _promise_."

He blasts Shigeru straight in the face, and the ex-Champion screamed as he felt the heated, electrifying energy course through his body. It wracked his muscles in pain, but he could only feel that for a single second because once his back hit the ground, a large portion of the woods was _engulfed_ in a green blast. The aftershock was a little too close to Zachary and now the singer was flying way out of the superactor's immediate premise. He screamed, terrified; even if he had a bit of strength to land his fall, with the _speed_ at which he was flying… he was surprised his hair was still on his head.

Suddenly his flying stopped and he felt Shona grab his collar in midair. Fifty feet above the ground they both were, and Zachary blinked and craned his neck to see that apologetic smile that everyone adores.

"My bad."

"Really now?" Zachary gave him a look.

"You said you wanted to watch." Shona shrugged. "There you have it. You did quite well against him."

Zachary snorted. "Thanks." They didn't need to descend, Shona can casually fly Zachary to the nearest hospital which was in West City. There was a bit of silence in the flight before Shona suddenly spoke up.

"What did he say to you?"

The sudden seriousness in Shona's voice made Zachary jump a little. "Well… he told me that he wanted me to join his uhh… his circlejerk of criminals." That made Shona laugh a little. "And then he told me that… uh, he was probably bullshitting this one…"

"What was it?"

"Well get this, someone in James' group of friends placed a hit on him." Zachary watched as Shona slowly looked at him with a deep frown. "Apparently, she is someone I either know or not."

Shona blinked, confused. "The only three women that are close to James are Lexi, Ashley and Kiran. All three of them have no reason to want him dead. His girlfriend wouldn't want him dead either." He shook his head. "Don't worry so much about that poop. He's bluffing."

Zachary laughed. "Yeah, no doubt. The motherfucker's brazen enough to make us think that there's someone with _that kind of_ malicious intent in James' group. His circle is nothing short of trustworthy, anyway..."

 **{}{}{}{}** - **{}{}{}{}**

"Alright, so…" James cracked his knuckles. They were supposed to leave two days from now, but the basketball player had found a chess room and invited the others in as well. All nine individuals were sitting on either the couch, standing, or sitting in front of the chess board -and that would be James. "You wanna play me in chess, huh?"

The others' attention gravitated to an excited Ambrose who clasped his hands together. "Sure why not?" And moved to plop himself down across from James. James looked at the beautiful man's face. "I haven't played chess in twelve years, I'm gonna be quite rusty."

" _Oh ho,_ well that's bad news because-" James flexed his muscles. "-You're dealing with one of the top 10 Globals in chess. Right in front of you. It's _game_."

Ambrose did not look intimidated in the slightest. Instead, his golden eyes brightened curiously. " _Really?_ That's riveting."

Zamasu looked over Ambrose's sitting position. His knees were tucked in, and he had his hands on his lap. There was literally not a _shred_ of assertion that he was making over James unlike _James_ himself, and that's what made this funnier than it should be. Not to mention…

"James." Ashley leaned forward. "You're playing chess with a _mathematician._ "

"Uh huh?"

"There are algorithms in chess games, y'know." Lexi said. "And he's much better than you at math."

James turned to Ambrose. "But are you better than me at chess though?"

"Bitch, math and chess are like cousins." Jay said. "You're gonna get wrecked."

"Well _sure_ , he won't pose anything for me." James proudly smiled and turned to Ambrose, who still didn't look intimidated. _For fucks sake_ , he was even elated to hear that James was a great chess player. He wasn't bluffing either; James could floor everybody in his entire friend group in thirty moves or less, and to hear that Ambrose hasn't played chess in twelve years? This will be _child's play_.

"You ready, _rusto_?"

Ambrose chuckled. "Sure." He sat up a bit straighter and moved closer to the table. "You start or I do?"

" _I'll do the honors_." He raised his hand. "Good luck while you're at it, Ambrose. This round can probably serve as practice for ya..."

 _Six moves later,_ everyone looked closely as Ambrose placed his final piece. "Checkmate."

"W _HAT?!"_ James nearly sprung up in his seat, making everyone else die of laughter from his bugging. "How the fuck- but you ju-... I didn't eve-"

"I told you you were gonna get your ass handed to you." Adrian shook his head.

Zamasu chimed in, crossing his arms. " _Tsk tsk_."

"What the fuck?" James looked down incredulously. It wasn't a dupe or anything, Ambrose literally just ended his confidence train in _six moves_. "I thought you said you were rusty!"

Ambrose blinked. "I am. I haven't had a game in a long time."

James articulated. "But you just beat me in six moves!"

There was a really cute, sheepish smile that frowned on Ambrose's face as he looked away and his voice trailed off. "...Yeah…"

"Okay no wait…" James now was looking for an opening. "Ha HA-no wait… HA- no wait… OHH-wait a minute-" His hands dropped to his sides. "I am literally _pinned_ , I can't make a single move! How the hell did you do that, that's cheating!"

Ambrose gave him a sweet, quiet smile. "It's not hard for a mathematician to figure out what strategy someone like you is using." James couldn't help the tiny smile growing on his face.

"Oh my gosh, I could have kept my boyfriend from being murdered in a game like this." Irene laughed loudly. "Come on James, get up; Global or not, you're no match for Ambrose."

"Hel-alright, you know what?" James looked at the trillionaire. "I'ma come _right back_ on you the next time we decide to do this."

"Okay."

James groaned and stood the hell up, because Ambrose's lack of fucks made him playfully frustrated. Lexi went up to her business partner. "You think you can come with us to Agrula?"

That is another lavish buffet restaurant. Ambrose gave it a very tiny thought, and Zamasu didn't need to hope for him saying yes or no; If no, he can easily spend time talking with him while everyone else is away, and if yes then that means Zamasu would also join in on the others' feast. It was a win-win situation regardless.

We'll pretend like he doesn't give a shit, because that's what he tells himself constantly.

"Sure. I might as well spend my last day here with you guys." He gestured to everyone in the room. "All of you just need to get prepared to leave."

And they did. They all also were reluctant to see Ambrose leave earlier than they did because he was such a sweetheart, but he did remind them that he stayed an extra week here as well. Chandler was going to be _very_ annoyed with him when he gets back.

"...Well, almost all of you have to get prepared."

He was referring to the Kaioshin in the room, who smiled at him. "You're leaving today?"

"Mmhmm. Returning to Tycho tomorrow."

"Hmmm…"

"What? You'd fear you'd miss me?" Ambrose had an uptone at the end of that sentence, that accidentally stirred some thoughts in Zamasu's head that he had to shake off.

"Not at all."

"Uh huh." Ambrose placed both hands on his hips. Zamasu raised a brow as the man turned around to put all the pieces away. He decided to teleport out of the room, leaving the knowing engineer alone and he would soon exit the room.

Rebecca knew Zamasu was still in the room with Ambrose. She wanted to at least wrest him (gently) out of there so that she can talk to him at least since… much like Irene, he was also enraptured in that rich pig's disguise.

Or at least what she made up of it.

She didn't waste time in pulling the game room door open, but she wasn't faced with Zamasu. Ambrose was about to exit right as she was about to enter, so she almost ended up bumping into his broad chest. He back off and held her before she should pull herself away with a slight 'oh'.

"Sorry, I was just about to leave."

She looked up at him, trying to mask the hate with an apologetic smile. "It's fine, I just kinda… walked in way too quick." The red head giggled while looking down. Suddenly being in this proximity to him was a lot more intimidating than she thought, and she cleared her throat. "Where's Zamasu?"

"He teleported." Ambrose noticed how she didn't move to let him leave, but figured nothing of it.

She blinked. "Oh…" She finally stepped aside to let him walk past. He smelled of citrus, probably one of the sexiest scents on a guy _period_.

"He might be in his room or with everyone else." He turned around to affirm her search with a tiny smile. She hated that smile, she hated his face. "Are you joining the others as well?"

Because of her secret endeavors, she suddenly felt really suspicious; not only was she probably failing to look genuine, but Ambrose was a supergenius, why would he ask her if _she_ was going? Unknown to everyone else, she kept her strings knitted perfectly well, everything would have went into place if it weren't for this smart guy here. Terry had his earlier run-in with a bunch of these undercover men, and they beat him the hell up and with that it _finally_ dawned upon that decade-to-middle aged man that Rebecca didn't fuck with him anymore. Once again, he was great to vent to and to get help from when she needed it, he served his purpose.

When it came to James, she made sure to use the information Lexi gave her when it pertained to the guys. The model did not know that James had switched up at the last second, and was practicing with his team rather than being in the masseuse parlor. They sent enough people there to fill up that particular floor so no stark witnesses (other than the masseuse women but they are weak) would see James get brutalized, but instead they got beaten by Adrian and the others by sheer _luck_.

She needed to get Irene away from him, she coordinated the whole scene with the image of James kissing so that James wouldn't have her support and it would be easier for Rebecca to push him out of the picture, but that failed because of Ambrose. Adrian's house being ransacked _also_ failed because of Ambrose and Zamasu, and the _both_ of them were now amicable to James especially the golden eyed man looking at her right now. She kind of distanced herself again from everybody else but not in the way she used to; she is _conspiring_ right now, she couldn't be looking on everyone and be out with them all the time.

Everything that had happened with these two, Terry and James, had been all coordinated by her. The bomb at her home… she'll have to have a talk with _someone_ about that.

So she would beg to know… _why ask such an obvious question_ , knowing they were her closest (by distance) people?

Rebecca looked like she piqued up positively. "Of course I am, why not?"

"Then you wouldn't need to worry about him." Ambrose said. "He'll be with you the whole time."

Rebecca leaned against the door with crossed arms, and a smirk on her face. "What makes you think I was worried?"

"You look worried."

Did she? Why did he have to be like a little child and objectively point shit out? That's annoying. "Oh I just, wanna talk with him about stuff."

The more he looked at her, the more vulnerable she felt. But he nodded and decided to leave her alone. There was a long pause not that she was silent; She felt foolish for some reason, and it made her angry to feel pathetic like that, so she just put the blame on him. On that perfect complexion, golden eyed sexy ass rich guy that has no idea that he'll be the one to aid in James' downfall.

She turned and walked the opposite direction Ambrose went, brooding, pondering…

 _Scheming..._

 **{}{}{}{}** - **{}{}{}{}**

Pretty much, the buffet session when deep into the dusk, with drinks and food and everyone laughing, playing, and chowing down. Zamasu didn't _drink_ unless it was Amber Rose; he settled for tea instead and listened to the stories Adrian, James, Ashley and Lexi had to say. Of course Irene was talking too, but we already _know_ the deal with him and her; you know damn well he wasn't listening to whatever she had to say.

While Lexi took to chatting with Ambrose a lot, Rebecca and Jay were hitting it off quite quickly; ever since she opened up to him, there was a whole new side to her that Jay hadn't seen. He found it quite easy to talk with her, she wasn't shy or hiding away like usual, she was open and quite entertaining for the most part, and _kind_.

An ambiguous throat clearing came from the trillionaire at the end of the night; when Chandler messaged him about his luggage being taken to Insula, he smiles albeit apologetically. If Chandler didn't straight up _call_ him for matter like this, the AI was probably annoyed with him... which happens far too much. For how old Chandler is, he could consider the creator of Rose Corp to be that _one silly grandchild that gets on his nerves_ like sixty percent of the time.

The golden eyed man kindly thanked the servers and waiters amidst their staring because he's fucking _here_ , gave a _promising_ tip and bid everyone a sweet farewell once they all were well settled.

The _goodbye_ part took like fifteen minutes too.

Zamasu especially was about to worry about Ambrose leaving since the man did drink, but it seriously looked like there was not a hint of alcohol in Ambrose's system, at _all_. The Kaioshin really thought the engineer was a lightweight (because he's really silly and loose when sober already), but apparently he was dead _wrong_. Let's just say he did teleport out of the buffet _just to see if Ambrose was okay with walking alone after drinking, even though the engineer only had like three glasses._

The God once again thought that he would only spent like a minute or two to let Ambrose depart, but _nope_ ; in fact, Ambrose was the one who said he would like to walk with Zamasu once again. It was mostly quiet at first because Zamasu was trailing behind him and looking at his outfit...

That maroon knee-length trench coat looked absolutely _sexy_ on him, paired with those polished, slightly heeled black loafers.

Somehow, whatever conversation they had started to revolve around fighting, he'd told Ambrose a bit more about his race and how strong they were. To all of us, his strength lies in the far cosmic level, a Galaxy buster at best. He obviously has not had a challenge yet, so the Kaioshin could proudly boast all he wanted since _he_ knew that no one he knew can come close to harming him.

Meanwhile, _meanwhile_ , Ambrose was smiling at him, unthreatened by this fact alone. He just wagged his finger and said, "It's not cool to boast like that. You don't know your surroundings very well."

Zamasu gave him a look. "You would know better than to test a God, Ambrose."

Ambrose walked ahead of him. "You wouldn't scare me."

"And what makes you think that?"

Ambrose turned around with a big smile on his face while strolling farther away from him. "I'm atheist."

Without a hitch Zamasu blinked to the trillionaire and teleported in front of Ambrose, narrowing his eyes. "And?"

Ambrose didn't even jump from the Kaioshin's sudden displacement. "I don't really believe in gods."

Zamasu was _right behind_ him at that point, and he took hold of the end of Ambrose's ponytail and gently pulled down, craning his neck so that the multi-engineer could see Zamasu's face. "I will _make_ you believe in me."

Golden eyes blinked up at him. "You sound like you're desperate for faith."

"Desperate?" He knew Ambrose was toying with him, and the religious undertone of that statement made that apparent. "You don't know the full extent of who's right behind you at the moment."

"Hmm." Ambrose's voice sounded really nice when it's _this_ close to Zamasu's ear. "I don't think I'm supposed to. Can you let go of my hair?"

Zamasu smirked. "Does it bother you?"

"...Sure." He had that coy smile on his face again. "But you don't need to do this to get your point across, you know."

"You don't seem frustrated at all." Zamasu pulled down a bit further, but not too much. Now Ambrose's neck was fully exposed to him, and the back of his head was against his shoulder.

The mega-engineer narrowed his eyes. "Is there an ulterior reason behind this?"

A frown from the green man, he kind of loosened his grip too. "What?"

"Why you're pulling at my hair and getting close to me all of the sudden." He slowly lifted himself back up and Zamasu could feel the soft, silky tresses of hair spilling from his hands. "About a month ago, you couldn't even look me in the eyes. Well… you still can't."

"What do you mean? Of course I can!" Zamasu stood up straight and looked directly at the man that was now in front of him. He stared into Ambrose's eyes for about two seconds, and then he started moving a bit farther from those golden pupils for a reason he didn't understand.

Ambrose watched the movement in Zamasu's eyes as well as his body language. He narrowed his eyes, noticing this same god starting to falter in less than five seconds. "Does looking at me bother you?"

The Kaioshin frowned at him. "No!" How else is he supposed to add on to this sudden immediate response without making it sound like he himself wasn't _confused_? "What made you think that?"

Ambrose looked back then turned to Zamasu, stray hairs swaying with his golden tan face in the cold breeze, and he raised a finger below his chin in concluded thought. "You seem… rushy, when you look at me for too long."

And by too long he meant mere seconds; if the tech-genius didn't make eye contact with him, the Kaioshin would easily watch on his actions. But when he'd catch those amber eyes, as confident as Zamasu is, he still found it super difficult, super _strange_ , to look into those vibrant pupils without blinking a lot. Zamasu's frown deepened. "Rushy? What do you mean by that?"

The black haired man slightly turned his head to the side while keeping his finger on his chin. "Slightly roused. I use that term loosely, because I'm pretty sure you don't personally see it."

Ambrose was speaking as if this was something so _blatantly_ obvious, and that scared the Kaioshin. Him speaking with Ambrose several times made Zamasu come to the conclusion that this man probably saw through nearly everything Zamasu has done, but has chosen to stay quiet. Not only that, but anytime he asks a question pertaining to the Kaioshin directly, he _always_ looked like he knew the answer already, and that would make Zamasu inwardly question whether or not Ambrose knew what he was doing or saying, or _looking at_.

 _That's kinda scary_.

"...Slightly roused?" Zamasu crossed his arms, and Ambrose nodded. The Kaioshin frowned, thinking on behalf of what Ambrose had said. "Why would I ever feel 'rushy' towards you?"

Ambrose shrugged. "I think you need to reflect on behalf of that."

Which the Kaioshin swore he wasn't going to, because he'd probably find something that he wouldn't like to realize. "Would I?"

"Mmhmm." Ambrose nodded, before taking a step towards Zamasu who _leaned_ back. "It's getting worse."

"Worse?" Zamasu asked.

"You pick out times where you and I would be completely alone, just to aimlessly talk with me." Ambrose crossed his arms. "Your eyes say much more than you think. You're conflicted."

"No I'm no-"

Ambrose gave him a stern look, quickly shutting Zamasu up. They were both at the very middle arc of the long bridge, right above a lake that was now a long sheet of ice. The trillionaire was standing in front of one of the sedimentary railings with Zamasu now facing him, the wind blew Ambrose's loose strands of hair and when Ambrose stopped to give him _that_ look, the air seemed to stand still.

"Are you going to continue keeping this up?"

Zamasu blinked. Ambrose's voice didn't change at all, but he suddenly became serious. "What are you talking about?"

"You're confused, and in denial."

That shit hit him like a ton of bricks. While Irene and the others say it as a joke, Ambrose was not joking this time. He _meant_ his observations. "Confused about what? About _you_?"

"Not me." Ambrose shook his head. "About _yourself_."

For some odd reason, Zamasu gave him a scrunched up look and he started walking away before Ambrose caught his arm. He didn't tell him to let go, either. He _was_ conflicted but didn't know why, and didn't want to admit it, so he suddenly became brash. He was a damn _God_ , no one knew him better than himself. "So is it your job to tell me about myself?"

Zamasu dialed back, even though Ambrose didn't look insulted in the slightest. The golden eyed man softened. "Not at all. But if you don't do something about this, it'll keep nagging you."

Whatever _this_ is is what Zamasu was afraid to figure out and he didn't know where the fear was coming from. He couldn't argue with this gentle person in front of him, so he sighed lightly. The heavy feeling in him started wanting to be spilled and _released_ , but he didn't know how to do so. He finally admitted… "I don't know what to do about it."

Ambrose took a step forward, making Zamasu take a step back. Ambrose had to hold his arm to keep him from retracting. "Don't do that. Face me." This felt weird, Ambrose was only fucking _thirty_ telling this old- _young_ Kaioshin to face him. "You can't express what you've been feeling in words."

"Then how else?" Zamasu gave him a stubborn look, as if wanting to cling on to the mysterious fear in him.

"Kiss me."

That stubborn look was wiped _right off_ his face and he _cocked his neck back_ with the greatest stutter he's ever done in his life. "W-what? W-why would I do that, doesn't that make you uncomfortable?"

Why would Zamasu ask that question to _this_ guy? He just shrugged nonchalantly, he wasn't even phased by the fact that he was talking to a God. "I don't mind it." Zamasu looked downwards. "And you need it."

Grey eyes looked into gold for a moment. He gave it a very scary thought, going any closer to that beautiful, flawless face would make his guts knot up. His kiss with Rebecca proved that he knew the handles and how to move around and _definitely_ control himself _and_ the other person, yet.. he looked like a shy teen in front of this man. That embarrassing thought alone forced him to push aside his gut for a moment as he stepped forward. Ambrose's mouth became a tiny, inviting smile before Zamasu went in and placed his lips on his.

It felt like Ambrose was a bit shorter than him even though they were the same height. He still found his hands around the man's shapely waist and _god_ did it feel right to hold him there. He was soft, like a pillow almost with how pliant his lips felt against the God's. Zamasu's thoughts started to trail to Lexi, thinking that this was what it would feel like if she were here. He quickly realized that was not the case; yes, Lexi was beautiful, _yes_ he loved that with her beauty came a sweet personality, and _yes_ he did have the tiniest bit of a crush on her...

But this was different. This wasn't the same flustery feeling he'd get when Lexi did something other than breathe. Those were nothing more than fleeting moments, and technically _this_ was too, but… it was stronger.

It was _raw_. It was sacral, a build up that brewed and bubbled its way from his chest down to his plexus. It was deep and warm, and filled with a wanting, almost _greedy_ sensation now that it perched itself in his naval.

No, to all you people out there thinking he's _hard_ right now, _no he's not_. This isn't sexual arousal he's feeling.

They pulled away, making a tiny smack sound, Ambrose arms dropped slightly so that his hands were on Zamasu's upper chest. Zamasu opened his eyes, from the still gentle way this man was holding him, to that kiss… and those golden eyes now looking at him with a tiny smirk… his whole body was on _fire._

Ambrose tilted his head slightly, seeing Zamasu's eyes trailed from his lips back to his eyes. "Satisfied now?"

He wasn't, because right after Ambrose asked, Zamasu yanked him in again for a deeper, harder, _hungrier_ kiss. He even moved forward so now Ambrose's lower body was against the railing and he was slightly leaned back to the icy river below them. His long hair dangled for a moment before Zamasu gripped the back of Ambrose's head with the other arm wrapped entirely on the back of the trillionaire's hips, angling his head as he saw fit. He didn't even feel Ambrose's hands on him, nor did he realize he was kind of messing up Ambrose's already messy ponytail but regardless, the burning feeling below his gut was now pulsing with vigor. He poured so much unknown, vulnerable, and repressed feeling into this second kiss now that he knew how soft and gentle Ambrose was, like a dainty butterfly, when compared to the rough, surprisingly fierce behavior of the Kaioshin. This somehow became his only way of showing all of the weird, needlessly pent up… frustration? He didn't know what to call it, towards this beautiful man; this went on for more than ten seconds, his intense making out with the 30 year old would have gone longer, and _harder,_ if his brain hadn't met his consciousness just now...

 _ **...What am I doing?**_

And just like that, he suddenly stopped. He pulled away slowly, with reluctance from those soft and still lips. He let go of Ambrose's hair and let his hand cascade back down to the small of his back and then… he opened his eyes while breathing heavily. _As expected_ the trillionaire had the most shocked, dumbfounded, confused ( _and_ adorable) look on his face; his hair was more tousled than before, his lips were slightly parted and his eyes were _wide_. Zamasu looked away, not in embarrassment of the action itself, but because of the sudden resolute feeling he had _over_ what he just did. He felt as if he just rightfully released something important. There was silence between the two, their abdomens were pressed together and their breaths mingled in the cold air around them. Zamasu was not about to let go of Ambrose either, but the much younger male blinked twice.

And then those parted lips ascended into a smile, before he straight up laughed.

"Are you _serious_ right now?" Zamasu gave him a cross look. "Why are you laughing?!"

"Your face!" Ambrose lolled forward, he pat both his hands on Zamasu's chest. "You look so confused!"

 _Did he?_ He thought his mind consigned the embarrassment as quick as Planck's time. Was it that obvious? "...Really?"

" _Yes_." Ambrose finally calmed down. "Where did that come from?"

"Where did what come from?"

" _That_." he did this little circling motion with his finger. "That intense craving thing you just had-"

"I didn't _crave_ anything!" Zamasu really hated how _obvious_ Ambrose made literally everything seem. "I just… I don't know."

"You do know. Now." Ambrose said, Zamasu looked into his eyes and realized _holy shit_ , he suddenly can look at him now. Ambrose was answering his previous confusion before they kiss in tandem with now. Zamasu was deep in thought trying to figure out what exactly he _solved_ , but was pulled out of it when Ambrose tapped his lips with a finger.

That stupid playful smile was back on his face. "Don't get so fretful about it though."

It was reassurance he was giving, Zamasu figured. The heated welt in his navel was slowly starting to fade, as if the gentleness of the trillionaire was calmly blowing it away. At least he did do that, otherwise Zamasu would've had another wave done on the 30 year old. His eyes went to one of the goldenrod buttons on Ambrose's coat.

"...But can you let go of me now?"

 _Oh_ , he was still holding Ambrose like he belonged to hi- _No._ "...Sorry…" Zamasu released him, and he hoped Ambrose couldn't tell that he didn't want to. He folded his hands behind his back. "You should go and pack up, like you said you were going to."

Ambrose tilted his head, Zamasu was really quiet. Once again, here's to the jovial thirty year old pointing out the obvious again. "You don't want me to leave."

Is he telepathic or something? " _Shush_."

"I'd like to walk over this bridge, we were going in the direction of my suite." He gave the Kaioshin a sweet smile. "Everything I brought is already in Tycho right now. Come."

Ambrose knew that if he left Zamasu alone, the Kaioshin would have this incident on his mind at all times and he would be too shameful to approach it with an appetent mind. It was healthier for the experimenting Kaioshin to trail down this path with him so that he could come down from his high without crashing. He of course was bringing up other subjects to sway the Kaioshin from feeling embarrassed; with his innate body language it was easy to make others comfortable around him. This wasn't a form of control, if he wanted to he would've allowed Zamasu to call it a night, but he can't do that…

Zamasu might misjudge the heat he was feeling as something _much more_ sensual way too early in.

The Kaioshin didn't feel the shame anymore as they walked. It was dying down with the witty comments, the catches and the silliness of the man next to him, and he suddenly felt so grateful that he didn't send Ambrose on his way. It made him appreciate his time with him (more than he did already), and this time he wasn't afraid to admit that he adored the man before him. When they both reached the end of the natural walkway, it was time for Ambrose to finally depart. The golden eyed man didn't simply wave him off though, but Zamasu was already turning around to leave.

"Zamasu."

Just like that, he stopped in his tracks and turned around to see Ambrose walking towards him. "What?"

What the trillionaire was looking for was that _glint_ in Zamasu's eyes, the one where he would look incomplete, and sure enough he found it. He gently rested both his hands around Zamasu's neck and gave him a quick, chaste kiss, _just so that he would remember it._ The smile on Ambrose's face couldn't be any more gentle. "Goodnight."

Zamasu almost didn't know what to say, but he nodded. "Goodnight." And then Ambrose released him, and walked away. Zamasu teleported out of the bridge's end and into his room, and took the deepest, releasing exhale _ever_. The window curtains fluttered from the window being open, so his room was colder than everyone else's. For a while, he didn't go to close it because he was still _thinking_ , but when he finally did get to do so, he found himself slowing down as he pulled the window's panel. Zamasu could now answer the reason behind his uncomfort, his attraction, and his interest in Ambrose completely…

That intimate interaction made him realize that women weren't the only ones who could catch his eye of interest...

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **He's** _ **biiiiiii**_ **… That's to put it in short, but this kiss wasn't necessarily him showing his attraction to Ambrose. Zamasu went around thinking he could only feel that kind of stuff towards women, the 'build up' mostly was from the inner him realizing that his attraction has no boundaries, or that he finds beauty in both sexes.**

 **To all you nibbas shipping him with the females, this isn't absolute; don't get disappointed. He's** _ **experimenting.**_

 **Looks like Rebecca's silence holds more to it than normal. Remember that fleeting question Zamasu asked her, of why she was upset after he told her that the guys were perfectly fine after the ambush? Yup, she was the one who ordered there to be a group of men to murder James right before his big game. She order a bomb to be placed near (inconspicuously) Adrian's house for it to be ransacked, and was responsible for sabotaging James with the photo of him kissing a woman. Those anonymous numbers she has are from a person closely associated with Shigeru, Andrea, and Merkel; the uhh… subbosses of this whole syndicate.**

 **Don't think that her being on Irene's side was entirely to support her best friend. She egged her on to think that her and James' distancing was more suspicious than what it is, and was trying to push Irene away from her boyfriend so that she can close in on the target she wanted.**

 **The only person who's come** _ **real close**_ **to knowing that she's the culprit so far, is Zachary. And Zachary doesn't even know her, and** _ **Shigeru**_ **knows that Zachary doesn't know her. He's got a lot of information on the entire group and their whereabouts and specific thing they do routinely, if anything, from Rebecca's closet number.**

 **With how rich she is, she's becoming a big problem for the others, but they don't know that yet. Not even Zamasu but if he does find out, she's** _ **fucked.**_

 **I should make a synopsis type deal for the second part once it comes out, so that people don't have to come back here and read this over to understand what happened- ...you get the drift.**

 **With that being said, I hope you guys have a nice day today, and tomorrow and all the other days in the future. I may or may not do a little something with Pride Bloopers too and then some, but this hiatus will go real fast. Watch, a few months will feel like twenty three seconds.**

 **See you guys in the next installment (uhh, probably not the right word) of this story. Kek.**


	41. Halfpoint: Basic Overview

**Boy, I might change this title. I dunno, it's not singing with me yet.**

 **This ought to be quite long since I'm not only detailing the plot, but I am pointing out very important things from the very recent portions of this story's first part, just so you don't have to read over everything again to get the jist. I promise I did the best I could because even though I'm pretty damn good at writing, summarizing shit is not my strongest suit for some reason. Bear with me.**

 **And if you haven't read it and don't want to be spoiled MOVE AWAY FROM THIS POST PLEASE.**

… **No like seriously if you hadn't read the first part of Unfair Punishment you're gonna be** _ **confused as shit**_ **. Don't do this to yourself, leave now and catch tf up while you have the chance.**

 **As for everybody else, we've come… quite a long way, haven't we? I'll give a kind synopsis of everyone we have met so far, and everyone who will further be in the story. Again if you already know who everybody is, skip this.**

 **Zamasu -** C'mon, we all know who this is. He's a God, he's stubborn, in denial about almost everything, and an adventurous fuck. Boom.

 **Irene Viberly -** The one human being that he very first meets, and the one he hates the _most_. She is an artist with a boisterous attitude, and slightly on the stuck up side since she's mostly been fortified in comfort her whole life. Akin to a _little Ms. Perfect_.

 **Rebecca Granger -** A doctor, and Irene's longstanding best friend who _currently_ is not looking for her best interest. She is mostly reserved, quiet and pessimistic at best. Being a new millionaire, and also owning a dog who belonged to a sketchy man, she especially was hit with the black van gangs (mainly because Merkel made her existence known to his subordinates). After a while though, she started getting associated with a person that works for the dark syndicate in order to do her dirty work for her. She used the syndicate to keep Terry away from her because she didn't like him, and her newfound target to destroy is James.

 **James Desmond -** Irene's boyfriend, one of the rich top league basketball players in Desna right now. He and Zamasu at first weren't friendly with another, having almost fought at one point- but after Irene's exhibition they both got to really know each other; now they're like two peas in a damn pod. He is a prime target for the syndicate because of Rebecca, so much so that even his coach's building was vandalized and Kiran was kidnapped, beaten and put in a duffel bag for not revealing where he went. His and Irene's relationship is still active, but he's second guessing his status at the moment.

 **Adrian Onyx -** A long time friend of Irene and James, and the best friend of Jay who is a co-musical producer, and sparring partner, of his. Zamasu calls him the better, male version of Irene since they are so alike, albeit Adrian is more toned down than she is. He, Irene and Rebecca went to the same highschool, and he used to date Rebecca. Though she used him, he has no problem with Irene and her friendship even if he and his own girlfriend ignore the doctor at best. That's going to change as Rebecca continues to push her way in with Jay.

 **Jay (Jukichi) Teshima -** _Literally Adrian's best man_ , and a recent winner of the last martial arts World Tournament (so he is very well versed in combat). He grew up with martial arts, so he and Zamasu synergize very well naturally. A no-bullshit brutally honest man who is dating Lexi, the model who Zamasu has a crush on. He was also the victim of bankruptcy from his ex-girlfriend (who received most of her help from Rebecca, and was sent to jail while Rebecca went off scot free). He had no business associating with Rebecca until she opens up to him about her rape experience, and also profusely apologizes for treating him so horribly. He takes in her apology but questions why she would tell him such a personal story.

 **Ashley Sims-** Adrian's girlfriend, and a writer who's written some of Zamasu's favorite books aside from _Endmite_. She is friends with Irene and Lexi but not Rebecca, she does not trust her _at all_.

 **Lexi Rayne - *Deadass Zamasu's first fucking crush ever*** A model who just recently started working with Ambrose Sarashina, a trillionaire _polyhistor_ (talented in multiple professions), on a new fashion line he conceptualized. She has a heavy fangirl crush on him, and since she's pretty Zamasu is quite tied to her features as well as her mostly bubbly personality. She is also inclined to martial arts too (thanks to Jay), but is substantially weaker than both Adrian and Jay.

 **Shona Tamarshirin -** A martial artist superactor known worldwide who is friends with Adrian and Jay. Zamasu dubs him as the strongest person he's faced on Desna so far (though the man did not hold a candle to Zamasu). He is a sweetheart at best, with a humble personality.

 **Kiran Lys -** Victim of James' huntfest, one of the singers that Jay and Adrian know.

 **Zachary Tenae -** Male singer with a divo mentality. Zamasu is most friends with him, surprised by the amount of power he dished out when they were ambushed. He only recently is being tugged on by Shigeru, who 'wants' him to join the syndicate.

 **Ambrose Sarashina** **-** Desna's _wealthiest_ man in the world, with a net worth reaching the _trillions,_ and the top supergenius in the globe. Much of his family, personal and relationship life are kept private, but the man himself is a positive, bubbly character. He is silly, yet insanely able to manage some of the biggest markets in the world today (tech, fashion, agriculture…). His exotic appearance and simple yet charming persona is what drives Zamasu to feel a bigger pull towards the man, that much is shown when he can't keep himself from wanting to be alone with him all the time. Rebecca on the other hand, is very jealous of how he became amicable with everyone she knew, because he stole all of her friends from her. Her vindiction is not known to him right now, however, and she's heavily threatened by his existence..

 **Chandler -** Yellow Super-AI who works with Ambrose and carries for him in the case of Ambrose being absent for other stuff. Like many of the other Hyperions, he holds a very sarcastic, blase tone when he speaks to someone, but is mostly cool and casual as an individual. Having been created years before the Seven Years War, Zamasu seldom spoke with him on behalf of the history of this planet. Most of their run-ins were either on accident, or from Zamasu trying to get to Ambrose. He is very much connected with the world governments, and the FPICA's director Mace.

 **Mace (Masahide) Teshima -** Jay cousin on his father's side who grew up with him through the majority of his childhood life. Much of Jay's personality is from him since he is older than him by eight years. As director of the FPICA ( _Federal Police Investigation and Criminal Agency)_ he is also known amongst the echelons of the government, but is not so much involved in that as Chandler is. In the top ranks of the police force, the director is pulled to leading direct investigations on the dark syndicate and what they could be. He and Zamasu are both justice-heavy, but he does not like Zamasu interfering with any human wrongdoings (much like Adrian, Jay, and James).

 **AI Hyperions - [Consist of Rogue, Bee, Chandler, Genyne, Netryne, Kandrid, and Amethyne]** These are the seven oldest AI to exist on planet Desna, since they were once the computers behind all the information of the world governments before the Seven Years War (circa ~70 years ago.). They are all color coded, and sometimes refer to each other in colors. Some of them are war vets (Rogue, Amethyne, Kandrid, Netryne) while others were sanctioned stationary supercomputers for different countries (Chandler, Genyne, Bee). They are the closest link to the government that a normal person can find chilling in South City, and they all still watch over the world and how it has been progressing after the War.

 **Superintendents Rogue and Tenebrist Bee -** both of these AIs work in the FPICA as the top superintendents, much like many other AIs and genius humans, and are closely associated with Mace. These two in particular have a hate-friend relationship with Chandler, since their home countries diametrically opposed one another; their programming hasn't completely voided that fact yet. Rogue is literally Chandler's nemesis like no doubt, these two can't go a moment without throwing shade.

 **Alma -** The young child who Zamasu ran into in the upper forests of North City's outskirts. She is highly intuitive, living alone in an abandoned cabin by herself. There is much mystery behind this girl and why Andrea has been after her.

 **Nousha Hasti -** Gunswoman sharpshooter. She, much like Ambrose, has a very exotic face. Zamasu can pick out her energy since its signature is different. Her and Naz's energy, in which Zamasu can single out, actually works as a suppressor.

 **Naz Hasti -** Pink haired well-known baker that works at one of the fanciest bakeries in Tycho. He is Nousha's younger brother by two years, and has an Efilian (British) accent when he speaks. He and Zamasu are tea freaks btw.

 **Ethan Nates -** Zamasu met this young man out in the street one night, somehow these two end up meeting at the weirdest times. He now works for Ambrose at Rose Corp as one of his tech admins (courtesy of Zamasu who flew him). Starting off as a clumsy, stuttering unconfident man, he slowly unwinds in this new job and the people he meets.

 **Terry Wu -** Once Rebecca's friend, this gynecologist no longer associates with her once she went cold on him after his run-in with a few men from the dark syndicate. He still talks to Mark on behalf of the investigations just to see _why_ he was singled out by the syndicate.

 **Mark Naner -** One of the leading detectives investigating the syndicate crimes. He is also friends with Rogue and Tenebrist Bee.

 **Merkel -** Bates' brother. He hates Rebecca with every fiber of his being, and is using the syndicate to destroy her for putting his brother in jail.

 **Bates -** earliest caretaker of Loki who abused him. Since he did not register Loki as his, it was declared that baby Loki was stolen by him and Rebecca soon became his owner, exposing Bates and getting him arrested.

 **Andrea Judenov -** One of the subleaders of the dark syndicate. Being very powerful she sits in the shadows and manages everything for the main boss. She is on a 'lenient' search for Alma at the moment. The other subleaders are Merkel, Evan, Duble, and George Samos.

 **Shigeru Sazaki -** Ex-Champion of the World tournament working for the syndicate. He deathly opposes Shona, because he cannot best him in battle all alone. He also has a bloodline vendetta against Jay.

 **Eminent Jiruda** **-** Ruler of the solar system Zyzen, far away from Desna's system. He keeps close watch of Desna and the dark syndicate for mainly reasons unstated, but he also loves picking his own pieces in a chess board…

 **B.A.** \- Female relocator and a spy for the FPICA. She was put on watch for James, soon becoming friends with him in the process. She also had a _history_ with Ambrose, the aftermath led to her changing her entire identity for a reason unstated yet. B.A is nowhere near her birth name.

 **June and Jean Maerly -** respectively, June is an innocent writer, and Jean is a cohort for the dark syndicate. They both are twins, so Zamasu could not determine the two apart from one another when he met Jean. Jean has an infatuation with Zamasu and his powers, she already knows that he's strong from the time she met him at her office. Because she possess a physical strength abnormality, Jean's petite body lethally undermines her combat output. June is the more mentally psychic one of the two, and the writer of _Endmite._

 **Boom. Those are the people that we should have basic knowledge of. Now basically…**

 _By Gowasu's advice Zamasu's sent to planet Desna in order to understand the mortals that he absolutely hates. Being under the seldom care of artist Irene Viberly, he ends up meeting more and more people, growing to become amicable to most of the mortals he meets…_

 _ **Most…**_

 _In recent times…_

 _In the month interval Irene is gone for her art exhibit, there was a large gathering of encrypting going down in Caplax. James was sought out for by a sector of the syndicate during his basketball finals, in which he invites Shona, Adrian, Jay, Mace, Zachary and Zamasu to watch his game. Under Rebecca's orders to an unnamed person, Shiegeru sends he and many men out to trap and murder James in a closet killing, but ends up getting pulled back by The Boyes (I'm sorry I had to) and the Kaioshin._

 _Rogue and Bee are the main superintendents behind any and every crime involved with this deep syndicate (they are what the black vans stem from), since they are the closest to the people affected by them. The rest of the Hyperions, or the other five AIs who were in the Seven Years War (including Chandler), are also on watch of what is going on._

 _Once Irene returns to Tycho, there isn't much affecting the main group other than Kiran's incident, where she was taken and placed in a specialized duffel bag and left for dead. It was then that Jay, Adrian and Zamasu found out that James was definitely being sought after. Embarking on a winter resort in Intima for three weeks, the 'attacks' on James become more personal, his coach hiding the vandalism issues at their main gym, and also the random woman kissing him at Tatch._

 _Nobody in the immediate group knows that Rebecca is the one composing this scheme. Shigeru had only let Zachary in on the passing secret, knowing Zachary doesn't know Rebecca at all. Because of how rich she is, Rebecca has nothing to lose right now, but she's treading on eggshells trying to pursue the people she does not like in an endeavor like this._

 _ **As of chapter 40,**_ _the group is two days away from leaving Intima. Zamasu has not only found out that he fucking loves food, but he also finds attraction in both males and females. We left off with Shona beating the shit of Shigeru when he intercepted Zachary in North City's woods, he almost spills the beans on Rebecca being associated. The next night, Zamasu had kissed Ambrose just before the trillionaire would return to Tycho, and lmao he finds out that he does not discriminate. Aside from this, tensions continue to rise through the rest of the world, with the dark syndicate starting to reveal their colors. The circle of Zamasu's human friends is also shifting, with the guys chatting less with Irene after she and James' argument, Lexi working hard to deliver for her photoshoot coming up, and with Rebecca starting a newfound 'bond' with Jay. Zachary and Shona were really close to finding out whose targeting James but since Shigeru is known to be a baiting asshole, they both discard the crappy info he gave them._ _ **Too bad they did, oof.**_

 _Zamasu came across the 'reaching' possibility that a group of surviving Mystics, peoples with activated DNA that grant them special abilities, are scheming to take over the world once again. They have been documented to rule over the longest lasting civilizations, but regular humans forfeited their artless rule; they were sought after and executed, humiliated, and absconded from by the major population. They only ever made up less than 1% of the entire human population throughout history, so Zamasu figured they were the culprits behind this._ _ **That is not true**_ **.**

 _Terry isn't being pursued anymore and decided to cut Rebecca off. He hasn't placed it behind him though, he's still looking around for clues, reasons as to why he was picked out._ _ **That was also Rebecca's doing, she didn't want him near her anymore.**_

 _Ambrose's new clothing line is on the verge of being released, Lexi and him have went over the designs of his product line, this isn't stopping her from cutting off the friendship she has with him. James and Ambrose are great friends at this point, though he and Irene's relationship is steady but dry. Jay and Rebecca are now closer than he is with Irene, and_ _ **Rebecca needs him for any information she could get on James.**_ _From now on, she'll have to switch who she can 'latch onto' from time to time; first it was Zamasu since he lived with her. Now she knows the Kaioshin will suspect something wrong with her very quickly, so she'll spend time trying to distance herself from him._

 _Rebecca's highschool experience of rape is completely true, it did happen to her after she had broken up with Adrian. For a long time, she thought he was the one who planned that out against her but she was wrong on that; not even Irene or Lexi know about her experience._ _ **Her trauma is not the main catalyst for how spiteful she is now;**_ _she also does not know that Zamasu knows this fact about her, so he might press her to think about her current stance in life, and right now she'd rather not do so._

 _Alma is the young girl who lives in the forest portion of North City. Her father is_ _ **very well known and very powerful**_ _, but her uncle is even more powerful. Whether if I'm talking about finances or actual physical power is up to you lol. Both will be revealed very soon. She has something to do with the syndicate subleader Andrea._

 _B.A. is the relocator who temporarily worked at Tatch to grab any suspecting information on James. She is a spy currently side-working with the FPICA (as stated in Chapter 34, briefly). She has a deep history with the trillionaire super engineer Ambrose. What happened at the ending of their relationship made her change her identity completely, as she couldn't accept the horrible_ _ **mission**_ _she took against him._

 _Jiruda is the leader of the_ _ **solar system**_ _Zyzen, which is far away from planet Desna. He's been alive for over 4,000 years, and progressively ruling Zyzen for half of that time. He is not associated with the syndicate, he isn't on their side at all._ _ **He's pitching in for their destruction, and taking his sweet time with it.**_

 **More than five and a half months have been marked on Zamasu's mental calendar. With time comes evolution, and he has befriended many mortals in nearly half a year. Problems arise, and ties break with this dark syndicate arising and planning to take over the world. It will only be a matter of time before _the squad_ will have to take them down, and no... it won't only be the FPICA.**

 **The following is information that wasn't in the story itself, but is important to the plot coming about later.**

 _The syndicate has been around for twenty years, only recently has their actions been propieted with a big more publicity (by publicity meaning the FPICA knows of their existence). Around eight years ago, the previous leader Don Vonan was killed and superseded by his closest cohort, who is now_ _ **the leader of this syndicate**_ **.** _Who he is and how he got to where he is now will play out in the future. This syndicate is run by him, he is a multi-billionaire, and they've been freeing certain people out of jail through bail. The 'expendables' are sent to jail only to be free later on. People like Shigeru or Merkel who are on the scenes of crime, never get caught._

 _Remember Bates, the man who abused Loki when he was a pup and was sent to jail?_ _ **He'll be around in the future.**_

 _There are Mystics that exists, many of them. They all live far away from normal civilization, but many of the older generations_ _ **are still alive**_ _and they are_ _ **still powerful**_ _ **.**_

 _Ethan's girlfriend is the younger sister of Jay's ex-girlfriend, she knows who Rebecca is and is very fond of the doctor._ _ **Very tiny fact, but important in the near future.**_

 _Remember the piece of paper from that box Rebecca opened? The address was Numen Province, East City, at time 11:54 (ambiguous of AM or PM)._ _ **That is the location at which the EMP near Adrian's home was planted.**_ _This was supposed to be the place and time at which_ _ **Rebecca was supposed to die**_ _, but after meeting someone who was a part of the black van crises, she swapped that out and made it a 'reservation' for whatever she wanted done. She opted for an EMP weeks after she got involved with them._

 _Jean is June's sister, who works for the shady syndicate unbeknownst to her twin. She is_ _ **many times stronger than a normal humanoid being**_ _. In lust for Zamasu, she'll find him with ease since she can sense non-human energy (and already knows the exotic ki signature Zamasu radiates)._

 _The Evan that sought after Alma (Ch. 30) is_ _ **not the Evan that works at Rose Corp.**_ _I just gotta put that out there because Rose Corp's Evan Nuzen is loyal af._

 _Shona has Mystic descent in his closest bloodline. That explains how fighting comes natural to him, and how his strength goes beyond brute force. His full power is actually equivalent to that of_ _ **Tier 6**_ _, or tectonic level power. To put into perspective, he's a little under three tiers beneath Zamasu, who is Galaxy buster level (_ _ **Tier 3-C**_ _)._

 _Both of Jay's parents are not alive; his mother died of natural causes, and his father was killed. The killer is unknown to this day._

 _When Jiruda was referring to those who 'control' the_ _planet_ _,_ _ **he was not talking about the governments. This ties back to the fact that the Mystic population is still alive and well...**_

 **This is all that is important to the plot so far. Can't say anymore or else that's straight spoilers. If you want, you can scroll down and read the rest, which is not really important to the plot, rather just extra info for y'alls.**

* * *

 **These are the locations of where every known person in Unfair Punishment resides in.**

 **North City** \- **James Desmond | Lexi Rayne | Shona Tamashirin | Zachary Tenae | Masahide Teshima | Rebecca Granger/Ollie/Loki | Jean Maerly | Naz Hasti | Alma (last name withheld, forest in outskirts)**

 **East City** **\- Irene Viberly | Adrian Onyx | Jukichi (Jay) Teshima | Thomas Granger | Zamasu | Mark Naner | Merkel Gerard | George Samos (freed) | Bates (jail), Loki (when with previous owner)**

 **West City** **\- Vivian Moreau (outskirts) | Chester Onyx | Kiran Lys | Nousha Hasti (outskirts) | Ethan Gates**

 **South City** **\- Terry Wu | Ambrose Sarashina (Rose Corp.) | Evan Nuzen | June Maerly | Tenebrist Bee | Rogue | Every Other Hyperion | B.A**

 **Insula** **\- Ambrose | Chandler**

* * *

 _ **ALSO I THOUGHT…**_ **'You know what, why not do some power scaling since.. What is a DB fanfic without power levels?' Since the majority of these people aren't really strong it'll be easy to tell who's at what. I didn't use actual numbers, I used tiers instead. Some people in this list have not fought in the fic yet, but some of these people will in the future. If you get somewhat irked by seeing power scaling of any form, you can LEAVE NOW WHILE YOU HAVE THE CHANCE.**

 **Zamasu : 3C (Galaxy Level buster)**

 **Irene : 10BA (Average/Low Athlete level)**

 **Rebecca : 9C (Street Buster)**

 **Adrian : 9A (House/Small building buster)**

 **Jay : 7A (Mountain buster)**

 **Lexi : 10A - 9C (High Athlete level/ Street buster)**

 **Shona : 6B (Country Level buster)**

 **Shigeru : 6C (Island Level buster)**

 **Andrea: 5C (Moon Buster)**

 **Zachary : 8A-7C (Small Town Level buster)**

 **Mace : 7C (Town Level buster)**

 **Every Hyperion: Ranges from 6B - 5A**

 **Chandler : 6A-5C (Continent/Nigh Moon Level Buster)**

 **Rogue : 5A (Large Planet Buster)**

 **Bee : 6BA (Country/Continent Level Buster)**

 **Jean : 5B (Planet Buster)**

 **June : 8C (Small Building Buster)**

 **Alma : 6A (Continent Level)/** _ **Undetected**_

 **Jiruda : 3BA (Nigh Universe Buster)**


	42. Twas An Idea Till it Ended

**Is it just me or every time I upload, it's literally on the day I work and I don't even work all week. Last time this chapter came about, it was Thanksgiving. Tf...**

 **Anyways lol, 41 and 42 are here in conjunction today. Hope you enjoy.**

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' **Twas an Idea 'Till It Ended**

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Literally the day after, at least thirty nine hours after he first sat down in his room that night, Zamasu decided to take to flying all the way to Tycho since he didn't even have many special things with him in the first place. He told the four individuals he was with that morning that he decided to fly on his own to their home country.

"Can't you just teleport?"

Zamasu looked at Adrian. "I developed a taste for sightseeing the oceans." He really did, there was something riveting about watching large bodies of water flow naturally. Go take a ferry and just watch the ocean, you'll know what he's getting at.

"Ah, that's fine. You can get a head start if you want to." Ashley said, she placed both hands on her hips. "Besides, we're not gonna do much today other than go out and repack."

"Yeah, you can go about your little voyage." Jay waved a hand towards him. "Stay safe."

" _Jay_." Zamasu straight faced, and the music producer raised his hands.

" _Just_ sayin'."

"Fair enough." Sarcasm leaked through the Kaioshin's voice when he said that. "I'll take my leave, you can tell the others of my departure."

"No prob'." James shrugged. "We'll see you there."

"Bye-bye." Ashley smiled at him, and Jay and Adrian bid both their farewells as well. Zamasu gave them a farewell as well, and he teleported to his room to grab his phone (yes, he actually _did not_ forget that). He then teleported out to one of the shore walkways of Intima. This particular walkway was empty, and a feet feet above the icy surface of the ocean, and he floated up before taking off into the South.

In essence, Zamasu's face was downcast, watching how the ocean went from pure ice to full liquid water in a matter of hundreds of miles. The currents far, far away from any country were a lot tamer, and he inhaled the salty, cool air around him deeply. He was substantially far away from pretty much _every_ country in the world right now, that much could be shown from the empty horizons all around him. He stopped for a moment to look all around; he seriously did not expect the ocean to be _this_ vast. He knew this planet was absolutely huge, but this must have been the Deep Expanse he was traversing; dubbed for its large ocean area, and also known as the Lost Seas a couple hundred years ago because many ships would get missing around here. He continued on south, zooming forward and a bit higher above the ground, at least until he was a thousand feet above the ocean.

It was a while later when Zamasu finally noticed a foggy sight of land far away from him. That was not Tycho, because Tycho was not _that_ far south from Intima, nor would the fastest way to get there crossed this giant stretch of water. This was a completely different place, from where he was it looked too small to be a full country but it might be a shore side or something. He closed in a bit, three hundred fifty miles, two hundred forty, two hundred thirty, twenty…

When he flew forward about ten miles further, a really unsettling feeling crawled its way into his gut.

No, he's not seasick, but he looked down at himself and slowed his pace; it was not due to something as meager as the water _far_ below him, so he just passed it off as something simple. But what could _possibly_ force Zamasu to feel that level of uncomfort? He had no allergies or anything, so he increased his speed back to normal. Not even two hundred miles in, when he started to see a bit more of this place, he had to stop.

This particular place, despite the slight fog because he was still considerably far… _it went passed the clouds_.

The 'island' looked like a _giant tree stump_ ; it seemed to look way too steep to be a single mountain, in fact it looked like a piece of a large mountain that broke off somehow, and is now in the middle of nowhere. Even though Zamasu was a _thousand_ feet in the air, he couldn't even see the _top_ of this… mountain range? This weird, stump-like structure? He didn't know what it was, but the rising feeling in his gut was pulling him from traversing this place further.

Somehow he recalled flying and seeing the vaguest glimpse of this island, only but a small sliver of it. He remembered not caring much but now his mind's curiosity was pulling him to discovering what this place could be, while his gut was desperately telling him _not_ to go any further.

You really think Zamasu's gonna listen to his _gut?_ Come now, he's a God who makes the best decisions, of _course_ he's going to continue flying closer to this island.

One hundred and twenty two miles in, Zamasu started to _really_ regret the curiosity he had because now… he was completely woozy. His feet and hands felt weirdly hot, and it became harder to keep his eyes open without straining. He groaned and stopped his flight to look forward; what could _possibly_ be affecting him like this? What's in this island that _he_ cannot see? He deeply frowned, no he couldn't _sense_ anything that was living within a few thousand feet, he couldn't even sense any ki signature that rivalled his!

Zamasu didn't know this island. This is the unnamed island that pretty much all of the rest of normal humanity deliberately avoids because of how supernatural it is. To the inhabitants in it, it is called _Sruy Venka_ , and the lowest inhabitants didn't live a few thousand feet from him...

They were around 18,000 feet above sea level. He didn't know that.

So the first thing he did was teleport around 10,000 feet from where he was, not daring to move any closer of course, and _that_ was an even worse idea. His vision got hazy, everything felt hot and energetically jittery and he felt like his feet and hands were now shaking. There was so much… he didn't know how describe it, energy? What type of nefarious thing could make _his_ body _this_ nervous? His curiosity was still getting the better of him, since he was far above the clouds he could clearly see the tall island but... it did not _end_. Even at ten thousand feet above the sea, this island _still_ stretched above the second barrier of clouds that were several meters above Zamasu's head. An usual feat, this could _not_ have been done naturally. He moved back, and went up a bit further, past the second batch of clouds, now fifteen thousand feet from the ground.

The Kaioshin's head started to pound.

How far could his extent of curiosity go, _before_ he would get a really bad migraine? Zamasu fought the urge to shake his head even though the pounding felt like it was coming an exterior source, like something intangible was _voluntarily_ hitting him. Above the sea, he held his face in his hands and accidentally groaned in pain.

That was a bad move, because the way sound traveled around here, _only_ here, made his groan sound like it was grazing his ear canals with sandpaper. It was angering him now, he really wanted to give this being or whatever it could be a piece of his _fist_ for attempting to gull him while his power was at base. He powered up, his ki created a large surge of purple that aerated around him, with that the pounding in his head lessened to a residual dull ache. _Now_ he could zoom up and forward and tackle this mysterious island with much ease.

Seventeen thousand feet came, he was just seventy something miles away and he would have been able to see the island plateau just a thousand feet above him… if there wasn't a weird film of black air five hundred feet above his head. Zamasu frowned deeply, what is _with_ this place? And why did he feel like there were random pushes against his body? It wasn't wind, it was like feeling multiple people shove you _away_ , and he started swinging involuntarily even is no one was there.

As abrupt as his head pounding, the intensity of his ki suddenly lowered; that was _not_ his doing. There was a deep rumble in Zamasu's body that he _did not recognize_ , and the black field looked to be something that's been… placed? Even seventy miles away from their land? Zamasu took to teleporting above the black air, easily imagining the darker sky ahead, and when he did so the 'film' rose up to his face.

The unexplainable head pounding came back, the vertigo settled in quickly, and his finger involuntarily shook like he was being electrocuted. His throat felt like it was closing in, and his body was weightless, _weak_ , and his vision started to fade. The black air started to dissipate, and the beautiful scenery of a small, almost heavenly green meadow in front of a even _bigger_ mountain-like range was exposed… but Zamasu could not see it.

The inhabitants stood at the edge of the island, watching as Zamasu finally lost consciousness and felt back down where he came from.

 **:=:=:=:=:**

He _shot up_ in a fit of shock, thinking that he was underwater at the moment since he did fall around seventeen thousand feet _into_ the ocean… Or supposedly he did, because Zamasu wasn't at sea right now; he was sitting in a very familiar grassy opening that looked to be a part of North City.

You ever play a game, die in it, and then respond in a completely random place? This is that moment right now.

He looked around, behind, and above him with a deep frown; what the _hell_ was that all about? He must have been transported here, but by who? By whatever was in that island? That was the only answer he could come up with, he could only get a small glimpse of the place before his consciousness was completely cut right off. It was a blotchy memory but he could tell the island held greenery, and was also much warmer at such a high altitude than normal. One thing was clearly made certain from that supernatural encounter:

He was not supposed to be there.

Whoever was there more than likely played illusions upon him, just so that he could get the hint and leave. He didn't, and whoever saw him may have been strong enough to overwhelm and even _siphon_ his ki signature. He shook his head, curiosity now evaded because of how horrible his gut and his head felt in that situation. One thing he did want to figure out though, was the being that was strong enough to make him pass out that quickly.

"Zamasu! You're awake."

He turned to see Alma returning to him with a heated wooden bowl and a towel slung on her shoulder. Judging from what she said, she was probably here before he awakened. "Alma… How did I get here?"

"I just saw you laying on the ground and thought you were hurt." Alma shrugged, but she was lying. She saw the Venkan fly over to where her tiny home was, they floated a hundred something feet away from her house before descending to this very opening and meeting her. The man said that Zamasu was trying to enter the island _ungrounded_ , which was very dangerous for anyone other than _their people_ to do. Alma was given a small vial with an elixir that would cleanse Zamasu of the residual aches he would feel in his body, and she poured it into her water and brought it a boil. Zamasu did not figure that out though, the exchange between her and the Venkan wasn't even going through her _head_.

Which was a good thing, she already suspected him to be telepathic from his occupation, and how strong he was.

"Hmmm…" Zamasu mulled it over. "You didn't… see anyone else?"

"No?" She blinked. "You just looked distressed laying here." She placed the bowl on the ground, not being hasty even if Zamasu was pressing inquires her way.

Zamasu looked into her water bowl; it smelled of herbs. He didn't think she would need to do all this for him, but she insisted on him laying down and letting her place the towel on his head.

"You don't need to do so much to take care of a God, little Alma."

She gave him this really cute shrug of her shoulders that made him ruffle her messy pigtails. "I do what I can."

"I'm quite close to your home aren't I?" Zamasu regarded her nod, before a thoughtful pause. "Odd…"

"What is?"

"What happened to me." Zamasu tried to sit up but she pulled him back down and he sighed. "I was flying, and I saw this tall island out in the distance. I tried getting close and I felt really sick before I suddenly passed out." He furrowed his brows. "Only to end up here."

"Do you get seasick?"

That question was arbitrary, but it made Zamasu slightly chuckle. "I wouldn't have an immunity against the sea."

"Oh, right." Alma looked down. "So maybe the people there didn't want you to get close to them probably." She was circumvolving around the reason for Zamasu being transported here. However, what she said wasn't far from the truth.

"How so?"

"They might think you were trying to harm them." Alma patted the towel on Zamasu's head in three specific places; both his temples, and right in between his brows. "You don't _look_ human you know."

He smirked. "Hmm…"

"Why were you trying to go there even though you got sick?"

Zamasu gave her a look, a _justifying_ one. "I was curious."

Alma frowned. "But if you were getting sick, you could have turned and left."

She was right. But he repeated himself. "I was curious."

"Zamasu…" Alma stood up with a hand on her hip while wagging her finger. "You know the saying 'curiosity killed the cat'?"

"Nothing can kill me, Alma. I'm not a simple cat."

"Well _sure_ , but you said you passed out flying to that island sooo…" She made open palms to the sky and shrugged, and Zamasu gave her a cross look… because she was right. The young girl plopped down. "My father always tells me not to go to places I don't know, because I might get hurt. You may be really really old and really really wise, but the unexplainable can happen to anyone."

Again, she was god damned right. Zamasu couldn't fight against her even if she tried, with those cute puffy little cheeks and those bright silver eyes and her messy black hair which... reminded him of…

"Alma." Zamasu felt the towel leave his head and she placed it against the water in the wooden bowl. He didn't take note of how _quick_ the ache around his body disappeared. "If you do know, who is your father?"

If her father was who he thought it was… because there is no other child he could possibly meet who was intuitive, who knew basic agriculture and was smart enough to entertain the God, who had a pippy, bubbly personality to her and lived the humblest of lifestyles. Her father had to be someone of high intelligence, someone who is well versed in mathematics, and also have the same sweetness that she had. There was no other person he knew who exemplified this better than… _him._ The man he kissed two days ago.

That warmth once in his naval made its way into his chest.

"My dad?" She asked. "I don't really know his name, it's kind of not traditional to know your parents name when you're really young in our culture," she scratched her cheek, "But there is an S in it."

 _Sarashina_ … That beautiful last name poured slowly in his head, like sweet molasses. "I may know who he is…"

"Really? I guess I wouldn't be surprised." Alma said. Then her smile got _really_ bright all of the sudden. "My dad's pink hair is something you can spot from a mile away."

Okay _woahhhhh,_ hold _both_ phones right now. "Wait… pink hair?" Ambrose had pink hair in the past? He can't imagine those gold eyes coupled with pink hair, that would be… _actually quite interesting._ "Didn't he have black hair?"

"Well, he told me that his hair used to be the same color as my aunt's when he was younger." She said. "Maybe you're confusing him for someone else."

"Maybe I am…" He scratched his chin. "Ah, nevermind then." It's quite coincidental to see such a bright child who has Ambrose's personality. Hopefully, he may even take Alma to see him one day, Zamasu was sure Ambrose would absolutely love her.

"Well then, who is your mother?"

"My mommy used to be an explorer." Alma scrunched up her face in the _same fashion_ as the trillionaire. How in the purple trench coat hell could she _not_ be Ambrose's daughter? She looks _so adorable_ right now. "Then after the… the fight she and daddy had, I don't know what happened. All I know is that she was really upset, and she started drinking a lot." Alma looked down. "A year later, mommy went insane and I couldn't do anything to convince her not to let me go."

"She wanted to abandon you?"

"Mommy knew she wasn't in the right mind." Alma kicked shyly, both her hands were behind her, fidgeting with the fabric on her back. "She kept crying about making mistakes, and said it was safer for me if I left her. Her drinking and drug use was something she didn't want me to live with."

That was… thoughtful, but Alma, being _five_ at the time, was way too young to just run off on her own. Speaking of which… "How did you end up here?"

"I snuck onto a plane." Her response wasn't quick because she was kind of guilty for doing that. "And it led me to Tycho. I was scared, but my uncle showed me around when he figured out I was here, which was a bit after I found that house over there." She pointed backwards. "I decided to stay here, but he visits sometimes. He helps me around a lot."

Zamasu looked sullen; Alma's been through such harsh environments. First her parents arguing, then he mother drinking with Alma still in custody, then having to leave her mother because she feared of hurting her own daughter… _god_ , that pulled at him in a very deep place. "Does your uncle keep you updated on behalf of your father? At least, for you to hear from him since, judging from the way you speak of him, he really loves you."

"He does!" Alma straightened, getting into a lighter conversation. "My uncle says that daddy really misses me, but he can't void -I think that's the word- the restraining order."

"May… I ask how he ended up having that?"

Alma was choosy with this information. Not that she didn't trust Zamasu, but her father's side of the family were… very intricate people. Her father got so upset that, in her own three year old eyes, _the entire house started shaking_. From that, her mother wanted to do him in out of petty anger, so she said he was violent to the eyes of the law, and that separated him from Alma. Zamasu was a God but… she'd rather he'd think that her father was like every other normal human being, even if she hated the lie her mom told the court. "He got really mad, and threw things. Mommy was hurting him."

Zamasu nodded slowly. Rash decisions were made on both parts. "Hurting him?"

"By being with other men."

 _Cheating_ … he felt his mouth turn acidic, how _despicable_. "Ugh…"

"But, but daddy wasn't doing anything wrong." She said, almost trying to reassure Zamasu that her mother's reason for cheating was not her father's fault. "He's really sweet and he never gets angry. His side of the family is always calm." _They have to be_. "But he's too sweet, he let mommy get away with it several times before he exploded."

She cheated _multiple times_? Now that's gross. "I'm so sorry to hear of this…" Zamasu looked down at the grass, his hand coiling a blade of it in thought before he clasped his hands together quickly. "I think I know how to get that restraining order voided."

"Hmm?" She frowned.

"The restraining order." He said, standing up. "But it more than likely take time. I will speak with a person that I know to take care of this." Like _Chandler,_ or like _Mace_ , the _head of the FPICA_ ; this won't be hard. "You miss your father a lot. I'd rather you reunite with him legally, I'm sure he misses you too." And maybe Zamasu might meet this man, maybe it could be Ambrose's little girl.

The idea of that made his chest swell up. Strangely, it was accompanied with a heat in his plexus, one that resembled possessiveness.

"You've done _so much_ , Zamasu!" Alma almost pouted. He squeezed her cheek and she gave him a cross look. "Don't do that."

"You're adorable." He smiled.

"Uh-huh, thank you." She moved her head as she that, that sudden sass reminded him of Ambrose. "But you created a bed for me and freshwater, now you want to bring me to my dad?"

"Why not?" Zamasu shrugged. "It would be a happy thing to watch."

"It would…" Her voice trailed off, and she thought about it. He can see her face swelling up with… hope, and it broke a part of him to see this little girl only wish to _simply see her own father_. He adored Alma, he wanted the best for this bright child and she sure as hell was going to go see her damn father.

"Run along home." He said. "I promise, I'll bring you two together."

She had this cheesed up smile on her face. "Thank you, Zamasu. That's sweet." She raised her hands. " _Give me hug."_

He chuckled, going in for her warm embrace. He can't _help_ but feel the same warmth, the homely secure and loving feeling that he'd get from Ambrose. Now that he thought about it, he should try hugging that man one day.

"Goodbye!" She gave him a wave with a big smile on her face. Zamasu waved back before he levitated up to tree height, smiling down at Alma while she stood here bidding him farewell.

He could have sworn he saw a tear fall from her eyes the very split second he teleported from her forest.

 **:=:=:=:=:**

" _So how was your trip?"_

Ambrose could identify that tone. He wasn't looking behind him, but he could _see_ Chandler's straight face and arms crossed. That was enough to make him smile. "It was _gooooooood."_

The guilt was settled in his voice like rock sediments in a water stream. Chandler was right behind him, standing in the living room while Ambrose was in the kitchen. "I _bet_ it was, so much so that you postponed coming back for an entire week."

Ambrose sighed. "Chandler, it is not uncommon for me to be away for more than I opt for. I've been keeping tabs even in Intima." This was something Chandler only did every time Ambrose didn't take him somewhere, it was his way of showing that he kind of wanted to go even if he's too ' _technified'_ to want such trivial things. He was getting too bored around the silence, and actually missed Ambrose's silly ass.

"Uh huh, but _still._ " Chandler insisted, coming around and into the kitchen to give the man an even straighter face, proving his point.

But Ambrose knew him for eight years, he's seen through it all. "You just wanted to be with me didn't you?"

" _That's not the case_." Chandler shook his head quickly, not even giving a solid yes or no. "What _is_ , is that you left such a notice way too late."

"I told you I would stay for another week three days prior to my return date." Ambrose stopped chopping his fruits to tilt his head at the petty AI.

"Still too late."

"Chandler!" Ambrose exclaimed, much like a grandchild with their strict grandpa. This wasn't even Chandler's business to run, it was _Ambrose's_ , and everything was in place even up to this date.

Chandler didn't let on. "Unacceptable."

"You just missed me."

"I'd rather not have a lot of work on my plate all alone."

"Which means you missed me." Ambrose gave him a kooky smile, and then he reached out to give Chandler a hug knowing damn well he's still petty. "Come onnn-"

"I don't do hugs." Chandler gave him a cross look, even though he was practically embracing the warm man.

Ambrose tilted his head. "But you'd hug my nephew?"

"Your nephew doesn't annoy me as much as you do."

"I annoy you?"

Chandler feinted an inhale. "Yes."

"But you're smiling."

He was, but again, that's not the case. "Never mind that."

"I _will_ mind that." Ambrose released him and continued chopping. "Unless if Evan, Ethan or Avery are calling me with any concerns, you'll live."

Chandler harrumphed quietly, and took a moment to glance at the tablet on the center countertop right behind the both of them. The casted screen on Ambrose's tablet was a picture of a jet black haired, silver-brown eyed Nousha making a kissy face at the camera with Ambrose right beside her smirking. He turned back to Ambrose. "Speaking of Ethan, he's been spending more time on his laptop during breaks. He told me he's been thinking of a proof to an algorithm; the Kluhmahn's Sum."

Ambrose stood a bit straighter when he heard that, he was in the middle of arranging his sliced fruits in a marble bowl. "Kluhmahn's Sum? How many cases have I heard of that, around five?" His eyes went excitedly wide. "He's trying to tackle that down too?"

"Yes." Chandler nodded. "He kinda… doesn't want you to know about it but…"

"And yet you tell me."

Chandler looked at Ambrose's face and almost 'snorted' over Ambrose muttering 'two-faced'. "It's not like I'm telling you what's _in_ his proof, I'm just saying he's attempting to _prove_ something."

Ambrose made a thoughtful 'hmmm' sound. He took his bowl and a fork and sat down in his living room while Chandler took the tablet and went to sit adjacent to him. The engineer took a few bites out of an exotic pineapple slice. "If you're wondering of that photo you put as my previous cast screen, I saved it."

The previous cast screen background was an aerial view of Ambrose's whole abode- his lab, his gardens, his and Chandler's homes, pretty much everything in one beautiful shot. "I figured. I also figured you've been talking with Nousha a lot more now."

Except those two talk literally every other day at least once now, but scrolling through some of the past messages, at least several hundred were made in the last few days-

"Are you looking through my messages?"

" _No_..." Chandler said, _still scrolling_.

Ambrose placed the bowl on the coffee table and nearly pounced on Chandler. "Give that back!"

"Don't _jump_ on me, I'm not human!"

"What excuse is that gonna do against me?" Ambrose snatched the tablet from Chandler's hand. He settled down on top of the AI and locked his tablet this time. He looked down at Chandler and shook his head. "Nosy."

"I was curious." Chandler shrugged. "Now off me."

Ambrose turned his head around as he stood up from Chandler, making sure that his hair would hit the yellow AI's face. Once he had plopped down on the couch _with his tablet beside him_ , he took his bowl and crossed his legs. "Since you wanna read my conversations with people, why don't you tell me about the thing Bee told you about?"

"Bee?" Chandler acted like he didn't know who that was. Their _century old and dead_ rivalry is still petty.

"Mmhmm." Ambrose gave him a look that said 'At least I asked'.

"Well, fine…" Chandler leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. "Basically, this one dude named Shigeru, or rather the MAT second-placer, got into a little fight with someone." He paused meaningfully. "He almost revealed some information about certain happenings in the dark syndicate."

Ambrose nodded slowly. "Like?"

"That was all he told me."

Now the engineer flailed his arms before they slapped against his thighs. "Then why'd you make it such a big deal went I was flying back here?"

"I wanted you to return sooner." Chandler gave him a dipshit smile. "And it worked."

That earned the AI a nice, kind slap on the back of his yellow construtor helmet.

 **.-[]-.**

Zamasu, at first, went to Irene's house and sat on his bed while looking out the window and into the plains behind her home. Then he spent around four or five hours scrolling through his phone searching for any possible information he could get on that weird island, but he only got the vaguest of queries back.

Mainly because the island itself hasn't been unexplored by the rest of the human population for over 3,000 years. Zamasu discovered that any data to be found on this terrain was inconclusive.

Nothing can penetrate the innards of the island without some sort of heavy drawback. Planes were not allowed to fly within 350 miles (an approximate, according to the Global Avionics Association, the main plane with a variety of jets and planes alike) because the vast area would cause heavily damaging electrical interferences. Boats or ships of any kind could not sail within _500_ miles of the island, and such is heavily forbidden for the safety of sailors and passengers since the ocean was 'too turbulent'. When Zamasu was there, he was long past 500 miles and yet the ocean didn't look too bad, maybe those who fell victim to the elements were probably assaulted by the _thing_ that knocked him out. He was far above the ocean when he got closer so he had no idea how the sease were at 200, or even 100 miles off shore.

Satellites or outer earthen ships couldn't capture any close shots of the island too. If they did, they would also face unexplained damages to their systems and utilities; from what Zamasu could see, the majority of the world had been trying to figure out what was in this planet for centuries, before they decided to barricade it for safety.

He had read a salvaged story about five unfortunate sailors who died at around 5347.12, or around 350 years ago. They had went a bit too close, some sources say 450 miles away from the island, and some say as dangerously close as 300, but the five men set out to cross Anasa. They took the long way accidentally, having to deal with a large stretch of sea and they were expected to reach the country in around 5 months. No one heard from them for three years, a search party was sent to figure out where they were. That party _also_ disappeared.

5347.19 came, and locals of Anasa found a large ship, the one that belonged to the five sailors, floating out in the sea. Too many weird mishaps were recorded when the ship was examined; the five sailors were there with weapons in hand as well, but they all appeared to be _dead in motus_ (or literally dying while moving). All of their fingers were completely _black_ , most of the outer soles of their shoes were burnt. Not only that, but the search party was there too; the majority of them looked like they were frozen in death with asphyxiated expressions on their face.

And frozen in death was right, because when an autopsy was ran on them, they found trace indicators of a deadly type of paralysis; their rigid muscles showed that these men were all stuck in their positions for days on end before they would die of starvation. No tick bites were found, but this was an autopsy done 3 centuries ago around the Industrial area, so Zamasu could only verify this information by the amount of sources that credited this explanation.

There were stories of ships exploding when going too close, or people just, _in verbatim, disappearing_ on sight. Things would twist or be thrown, mechanical or electrical devices would shut right off, and even glasses would shatter if said plane or boat was too close. This place was absolutely dangerous, and for a reason that Zamasu still has yet to figure out.

It was a disappointing information hunt all in all, he couldn't find anything other than those stories, he wanted to know things like the geography, the climate or even the inhabitants in there. What human could possibly live up in that mysterious place? He shook his head, no humanoid of this planet could survive at such high altitudes. When he finally got off of his phone he realized that the sky was starting to get dark. It was only like 6 in the evening too, but Tycho has been getting colder in recent times.

Not as cold as Intima, but _chilled_ nonetheless.

He put his phone down, and walked around Irene's home. He even went down to her painting area room thing (he called it that) and was instantly hit with the scent of acrylics and oils. Nostalgia came about him again, he digested it quick enough when he saw this one photo of a woman raising her finger up, as if to say 'wait', to a pitch black corner of the drawing while looking elsewhere. It looked weird, but very vivid despite being in only black and white, and even with the darker part of the room lacking any light to reflect what exactly lies in it.

He momentarily wondered why that black and white painting was placed right in front of all the vibrant, more colorful ones on her shelf.

He took to Rebecca's mansion, thinking that his canine children were there but he was surprised (and alarmed) to see that they were not. Also, there was a weird thing that looked like a controller sitting on Rebecca's coffee table. Unknown to Zamasu, Thomas had forgotten his controller here in the heat of his scare and had taken the dogs away. He wanted to return them the very day she gets home.

The Kaioshin recalled the doctor telling him that she had a relative taking care of her dogs, he didn't really expect said relative to take them _out_ of her house but that was him being a little too protective.

Hell, why _wouldn't_ he want to know where his sons were? They weren't Alma, that's for sure. If they weren't here, he wasn't going to badger whoever's taking care of them. He was sure they were in good hands.

He left her home, this time choosing to fly above her house and off to, mayhaps, South City. He only reached the outskirts before he felt something peculiar; there was ki in this part of the outskirts, and it was _formidably big_. He can't imagine anything other than an adversary with that kind of ki since Desna humans were weak compared to him with the exception of Shona, so he descended to see what it was. Not that he _cared_ if something terrible were to attack South City…

Once he touched ground, he followed the energy trail until it started to dissipate, then frowned at the abrupt disperse; mayhaps this being sensed him and decided to run away, though he had to pause at that. He didn't fully have God ki, much like Rumshi or Gowasu did, but his lineage made him _very hard_ to locate since his ki was not on the same wavelength as Desna's humans. Unless if this being was _insanely powerful_ , or a Shinjin like him, or even the entity had knocked him out, there should be no reason for them to leave this vicinity.

He heard footsteps behind him.

"Getting lost in the woods, aren't you?"

He was walking around in thought before he heard that very familiar female voice, albeit it was much more… mischievous this time, and he turned around to almost growl at the woman now strolling to him. Her hair was actually darker this time, with black highlights around her roots, but that didn't _disguise_ the fact that he was standing in front of who he knew it was.

"Never would've thought I'd cross your path again, Zamasu."

Even the way she said his name made him want to wretch. " _June…_ "

She was wearing a prussian blue catsuit with combat looking sneakers. The catsuit itself looked to be reinforced, or made out of a much thicker material than normal leisure catsuits are, she also looked to be slender yet fit, and was standing in front of him with a more than testy look on her face.

His eye twitched. "I thought I warned you to leave me alone." Zamasu crossed his arms. "Or perhaps you're foolish enough to think you can challenge me?"

"I don't remember you saying that." She smirked. "You told June that, not me."  
Oh _now_ she's playing games with him, huh? "Quit playing games with me, June. There's no one in this world that looks," _and acts, ew,_ "Like you."

"You sure about that?" Despite his frown, Jean took a few steps toward him as he took a step back. "Maybe you're ill informed on this one, hun. I'll set the record straight; I am Jean, June's twin sister. You never spoke with June in her office before." Her eyes became coy. "But I know you've yelled at her for what I did."

Wait a minute… okay no, Zamasu had to weight this in; June never looked like the type to straight up lie that bad, he can tell once he pushed aside her whorish behaviour, but if what this Jean woman said was true… that just meant he yelled at a poor young woman who had no idea of what he was talking about.

 _Oooh, this had to be bullshit._

"Prove it." Zamasu said. "I'm not stupid, and you cannot fool me, _June_."

She had already pulled out her phone and opened a picture of her and June smiling as children, showing it to Zamasu. The Kaioshin widened his eyes, _they look way too alike_ ; normally with twins you can distinguish them from their clothing or even their facial features might have slight differences, but these two look exactly the damn same, like carbon copies. Even the way they dress looked the same-

Zamasu took a moment to think about how June looked when he first met her at Adrian's house, compared to when he was in her office. June wore light colors and generally had a kind demeanor about her while _Jean_ was not conservative with her clothes, and she wore more darker accented clothing. Something as simple as that slipped right under Zamasu's nose.

Not to mention… he was actually sensing _ki_ in this woman. June had no considerable ki at all.

"See?" Jean, for some reason, place her phone on the ground, and then kicked it twenty feet from where they stood. "I did relay our… chat with her. She knows about it, you don't need to worry."

 _I_ _don't need to worry?!_ "You are a horrible person." He shook his head, malice literally seeping from his words. Not only did she try to touch him, but she played ass someone completely innocent as well? _Hell_ no, she wasn't getting out of this scot free.

And it looks like she figured that out as well. Her chuckle made that very clear "I've been waiting to find someone worth my time." Jean said, she circled around him. "Aside from… obviously sex, I still crave an adrenaline rush from other activities." She paused, and turned her heel to fully face him again. "Your ki is immense, despite how lean you look you still pack quite a punch."

Oh no, Zamasu raised his brows, _she knows how to fight._

"And what of it?" He shrugged. "You think your puny energy could stand godly might? You're insane."

Just like that, her ki level _skyrocketed_ , and the loose dirt and rocks beneath and around her flew up against the energy spike. Her blue hair was now highlighted around the end with greenish yellow energy, and she raised both fists to rest just below her chest. "I wouldn't say that. Adventurous is the right word, _God_." A palm came at him at a speed he seriously did not expect her human body to move. He felt his hair whoosh and his gi rustle violently at her current. "Show me a good time."

She punched him, Zamasu countered her quick blow with a fist but not her force. His feet skidded harsly against the dirt, he was only sliding backwards several feet but from the looks of it, his boots were an inch into the dirt ground. The two ended up flying into several trees before escalating to a barrage of kicks and punches, Jean was packing a surprisingly _hefty_ prowess beneath her punches. The Kaioshin found himself actually having to make an _effort_ to block her. This was unlike his fight with Shona, while the martial artist was indeed powerful, blocking him wasn't as strenuous because he is a born fighter; he knew that precise hits would guarantee more damage, and blocking an actual martial artist was easier because you would know where they were heading. But Jean wasn't that well versed, in fact most of her hits-

Like the punch he just got to his face, throwing him back down to the ground and he expertly back flipped once he touched the ground…

-Were not precise, they were sloppy; yet, they still manage to cause at least some semblance of _pain_ in his arms and hands notably. Which was scary, because… imagine the damage she could be doing if she was as good at fighting as Jay, Shona, or even Lexi or Adrian. Jean would be a walking weapon in _his_ book, and a deadly arsenal for any human that dared to challenge her. She still is, but her potential is also frightening to think about.

What's even more frightening, is that Zamasu found himself actively using up more of his ki than he thought he should. They were up in the air, having flown far away from the rest of South City, and Zamasu's right hand started to glow a familiar purple. He was told not to kill anyone, but his God Split would only serve as a way to minimize this crazy woman.

He tossed her palm aside, now he had her body facing away from him. His hand became an aura-filled blade,he looked at the very end of his wrist, and swung down to swiftly neck chop her into unconsciousness.

…

"What?!"

Her heated glaze faced him just milliseconds before his wrist made contact with her hand, and _her_ hand was now holding his wrist, right below where his purple aura was conjured up. Zamasu's eyes widen; there was _no way_ she could have reacted _that_ quickly, his hand would have came down at her in less than half a second.

"What do you mean 'what'?" Jean's face grew into a smile. "You're pretty fast, but I'm not someone you should treat like a normal human being."

She now gripped his wrist so tightly, that it _actually_ made Zamasu wince and rip his hand from her grasp. "How is it possible for you to be so strong?"

Jean stood straight now, legs together and feet relaxed since they both were floating far above the ground.

"Genetic abnormality." Was all she said, and when Zamasu raised a brow she continued. "My twin sister and I were born with unequal distributions in our bodies. She is not very physically strong, but her brain power is quite impressive, hence why she tends to attract otherworldly beings and can write exceptionally well." She gestured to herself. "I was born with my bones and muscle tissues being thicker than average. That's why I don't need a lot of body mass to look strong at all, even if I'm as powerful as many bodybuilders."

Zamasu raised his brows. "And your ki?"

"I can manifest it easier." Jean said. "June's body isn't strong enough to amass visible life force, but she has psychic abilities."

 _No wonder why June could write amazing stories about otherworlders…_ That's something he wouldn't really expect, but it made sense to combat how strong she was. Even _he_ had to be serious to block her, but he can't imagine her abnormality to be the only reason for her strength. Nor can he imagine combat to be something she solely wanted from him… _obviously_. "You just wanted to see how strong I was, didn't you?"

"You interest me." Jean went closer to him with _that gaze_ , and he backed away. "You don't show a lot of your ki, and to pick you out is like finding a shoe in a bag of rocks. It's very different… clandestine…" She stroked her bottom lip for a moment. "Where is your power coming from?"

"Me." Zamasu simply answered. "You cannot sense most of my power because you are not strong enough."

" _No_ , it's that God status of yours, isn't it?"

She connected the dots quite quickly and he almost forgot that he _did_ indeed tell her that he was a God when they first met. But that's not something that she should know. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me."

"You will address my _species_ with respect, Jean." He rebutted, rather than showing any shock. "Your strength does not give you the right to _be level_ with me."

She was visibly getting turned on by the way he put his foot down on her question, which she'll not forget. "Answer me though; you Gods have an energy that we cannot tap into, right?"

Her _voice_ even sounded horny. "That is none of your business."

"You don't need to hide it from me." She tried getting even closer. "If you're so irritated by the way I'm speaking, why don't you punish me, _God_?"

 _Helllllllllllll no,_ he's an innocent man but he knows _exactly_ what she meant by that. "If you want to continue fighting me, go ahead. If not, I'd rather you leave and never come near me again. That is a _warning._ "

"That's not gonna work on me, hun." Jean shook her head. "Remember when I couldn't keep my hands off of you? Simple words won't do the trick."

He strangely felt like he was cheating on someone when she said that for some odd reason. That just sounded wrong, and frankly, he did not want to hear it anymore.

He teleported behind her, and sent a spinning kick to her back so hard that she zipped straight into the floor, creating a huge crater and causing trees and debris around to fly. The Kaioshin watched the dust spread, he shook his head and clasped his hands. " _Humans_ … Can't keep their desires to themselves."

And with that, he teleported out of the sky, leaving Jean deep in the ground and alone.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Zamasu on begone-thot mode is the most savage form of Zamasu yet.**

 **What do you think could be in that island? Or rather** _ **who**_ **do you think? And why would Alma keep her witness account secret from Zamasu?**

 **What is Nousha to Ambrose?** _ **Hmmmmm…**_

 **The black room woman painting symbolizes something dark and possibly horrible awaiting. The woman is raising her finger up and turning her cheek the other way as if she knows that there is something ominous looming her way but chooses to ignore it. Why it was placed in front of the paintings was because it is a** _ **forefront**_ **situation, something that heavily overshadows the rest. Symbolism is** _ **fun**_ **, guys.**


	43. Return of The Pack

**Updates might or might not start to become more regular. It all depends on the traction I get around here.**

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 **Return Of The Pack**

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If it's exploring, then he's done quite enough of _that_.

In a day and a half, Zamasu got knocked out trying to visit an untouched premise, learned a little bit about Alma's past, read for hours about all the conspiracies based around a way-above-sea island and fought a woman who wanted him hot on her bed.

You would think he decided to stay in Irene's house afterwards in the middle of the night _to settle his kettle_ but _nope_ ; hours later he was many miles away from her home, in North City's mainlands where many of the big houses were. Some of them _rivaled_ Rebecca's home size and some were _double_ that. Some were smaller but eye-catching, like this one rustic home he stumbled across while flying around. He landed, sensing ki in there and realizing that its signature was vaguely familiar. The front of the house gave a full view to the living room, which was mostly themed with polished wood, and a bit of the kitchen. The windows he could tell were slightly tinted, but that wasn't doing much to the exposure. He imagined this person to be not as rich as Rebecca but pretty wealthy, since their home was decorated liberally, but he vaguely felt like he would know the person living here.

 _By accident_ , Zamasu got closer, up until the point where he can fully make out that the person was indeed in the kitchen area. All he can see was their legs because they were bent over looking for something, and he was about to dismiss his curiosity until the person finally stood up and moved away from the wall, in full view of the Kaioshin.

His eyes went wide. This was _Lexi's_ house.

How the hell hasn't he been introduced to this area on his own? The house itself was absolutely marvelous to glance upon, serving as decorative eye candy for the God. Somehow, it managed to match her tastes perfectly, like if he really wanted to, he could imagine her living in a place like this prior to this morning.

No wonder why it caught his eyes so quickly.

Lexi and her friends returned from Intima about four hours ago, not surprised by the fact that they were a bit too early. At 6:30 in the morning was when she got home and she planned on taking a short nap that ended up being like five hours long. When she woke up, it was a quarter to twelve, and the first thing she did was say 'good norning' to her friends, including her hot, rich business partner…

Who remarked that it was nearing the afternoon, but she digressed.

She just finished making pancakes from a premade mix because she was still kind of worn from the jet lag, but it didn't take long for her to feel heavy eyes on her person. Lexi found herself glancing over her neck a few times over the strange feeling but didn't turn all the way around until it _really_ started to simmer in her awareness. When she did, she was met with the wondrous gaze of Zamasu.

"Oh, hey!" Lexi waved, and then realized that he obviously can't hear her through the damn glass walls. So she mouthed for him to teleport into her house, and was surprised when he shook his head almost profusely. _Almost._

The reason why was because the model was wearing a under armour tank top with shorts that made her butt and body look absolutely _divine_.

Now the woman walked up to her see-through door, opening and peeking over it to address the now heated-faced God. "If you're gonna stand there and stare, why not make yourself at home?"

 _Get a_ _ **hold**_ _of yourself._ Zamasu blinked twice. "I only glanced upon your place from a skyview and thought it looked nice. I did not know this home belonged to you."

"Ohhh." Lexi frowned, and looked him up and down. "Why are you so stiff over here, Zamasu?"

...You guys have dirty minds if you think she's not talking about the way he's standing. _Shame on you._

"I-" Zamasu didn't know why, but he decided to relax a bit. He seriously stood exactly the way he did when he first came to Desna; stiff, no bounce, and no gusto in his poise. "What are you doing in there?"

"Breakfast." Lexi said. Tapping her nails against the door frame. "It's pancakes, waffles, annnd a thing of sparkling cider."

"How many?"

"Uhh…" Lexi looked to her kitchen for a moment. "Maybe like three pancakes, and three waffles-"

"That's too much for you."

Lexi smiled. "Well, come help me eat it then!"

Zamasu teleported into her house, instantly hit with the scent of all of her breakfast foods combined together. He sat down across from her, ignoring the fact that she smelled like orchids again, and conversed with her for a bit. Lexi told him that Irene had just finished cleaning his room (his room is already friggin clean but Zamasu thought that she was trying to sneak-insult him by saying _he_ was unorganized), and that made him roll his eyes. She also said that Ambrose and she were going to start the 'modeling thing' (she had to use layman terms) very soon. They had already conceptualized everything through texts, meetups and video chats.

"Have you spoke with Rebecca lately?"

That question came about after silence fell between the two. Zamasu blinked. "How lately? I wouldn't have done so when I was out of Intima of course."

"You have a phone."

He completely forgot about that device's capabilities again. "Right…"

"So you haven't?"

"Not extensively." Zamasu said. "Why?"

"She's been really quiet." Lexi twirled her fingers together in thought. "I mean, I know Ambrose is someone she doesn't really like but-"

"She does not like Ambrose?!" Zamasu cooled himself down immediately after she said that, not expecting to practically yell at Lexi. It almost sounded protective, and that may have been from something subconscious…

"Well, no," Lexi chuckled a bit, "But when he came around, maybe even a little before that, she just stopped being so involved with us." Lexi stood up to put both their dishes in the sink. Zamasu refused to look at her backside. "I hope she's okay, and nothing bad happened to anyone she knew. Maybe that's why she was so quiet..."

 **[:::::::::]**

"I thought we had a _deal_."

"We did, Ms. Granger." Duble said over the transmitter, with a thick East Tychian accent (which sounds like a lot like a New Yorker). He was sitting in one of the main headquarters of the syndicate's base, located on the furthest country of the six; _Draco_. This was where their operations took place. "You paid to have hits on other people, and we supply you with what you need."

"Then explain _that_." While Duble was speaking, Rebecca had her phone on speaker while she was pulling up a text she received from her little brother, as well as the report of a 'strange bomb mailed to a mansion'.

Duble on the other end looked down at his phone when it blinked a notification, and he raised a brow. This wasn't something his side of the syndicate was doing, so he immediately assumed it was from some other crime gang that had no ties to them. "That was not us though."

"Who else could it be?" She nearly raised her voice, almost slamming her hand against her kitchen countertop. "Nobody else should know about this business. If this is happening then that means my information has been leaked by one of you."

"Everything you have said and vice versa, has been encrypted." Duble leaned forward towards the transmitter that Rebecca was calling him from. "No meager person could hack into our database, let alone anyone in the highest reaches of the police force like the FPICA." Which technically means that Rebecca was indeed right about the threat coming from them.

She gritted her teeth, but took a deep breath. "How many people are managing your gang?"

"Those numbers are aside you." He said smoothly.

There was a pause. An angry one. "So is the whereabouts of this bomb's origin aside me too?"

He could damn near _feel_ her seething through the transmitter. "Calm down over there. You ought to do so when speaking with me."

And calm down she did, she took deep breaths again while Duble took the time to think. "What was on that bomb then, since you are inclined to think we would double cross someone as loyal as you."

 _That_ was a sneak diss on her part, because his recent intel showed that Rebecca was after two people who were close to her. He _could_ chuckle to himself right now, but he pushed that aside when Rebecca replied. "It was for Terry."

His eyes went wide… A team _was_ keeping tabs on Rebecca's mansion for a while. They even had a reparation balance for all of the damage if said bomb had exploded in her house; this came from what he was reading through a database containing all of the objectives that were carried out which were pulled open right when Rebecca told him that. This bomb situation was under a tab that said 'unfinished', but it was not listed by him… or Shigeru, or Samos or even Evan, and Andrea wouldn't do this since she is a supervisor of the five of them… In fact, it could be considered a 'blacklist' in _their_ datum...

He thought back to the criminal record of Merkel. Then he thought about the _relatives_ of Merkel, like the one that was currently in jail right now for animal abuse… _Bates._

Duble had to choose his words wisely. Not out of _fear_ , of course, because Rebecca was nowhere near a formidable enemy, but he'd rather have Merkel's name kept out of her frame of mind. "I can guarantee that such a thing was not done to you by me."

"Then who did it?"

He didn't answer her question directly. "...You _do_ know that if you mess with a criminal, not to mention a large group of criminals, you'll expect some form of 'backlash' to happen, right?" He put air quotes on the word 'backlash'. There was a short pause.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Rebecca stood straighter. She felt insulted.

"Think about it." He allowed her to mull over it for a few seconds before speaking up. "Some of my closest associates actually know you. You and their relationship are… not on very smooth tides. That is all I can say."

The idea of someone from a syndicate that is capable of pinpointing a home and sending a small capsule of something poisonous was already enough to make Rebecca, from three-ish months ago, go pale. Now, knowing that somebody on the other hand was after _her_ made her hands grow cold. "Who _are they_?"

"I'll reaffirm that I cannot say any more, Ms. Granger." Duble shook his head. "This person had it down that Terry was visiting your home while you were in Intima. I highly doubt, given the considerably far time-frame between your departure and the incident, that this person wanted _you_ dead."

Rebecca's eyes went wide, but Duble continued. "If they did, they would have had you sniped in your suite in Intima. We do not wait for those who aren't celebrities; we make our move within the first strike. But debts are to be paid; if you wish to ruin someone's life, not to mention _end_ their life, you will lose a _lot_ in return."

Rebecca felt like Duble was _hinting_ that this person, whoever they are, was trying to ruse her into fear over her endeavors in order to kill her too, mayhaps end her charades by removing her from their little equation of destruction. "Are you telling me to watch my back?"

"No." Duble propped his leg on the table. "I'm telling you to know what you're in for. Don't think that this business we have will leave you without any scars, _princess._ " Rebecca's eyes twitched. "This isn't a simple market deal; you're dealing very dangerous cards even speaking directly with me, it's very apparent that you aren't keeping that _deep_ in mind every single day you walk and breathe. Take it as a scare if you will, or use what I said as pure advice."

The safest route, for her sanity, is to do the latter rather than cower at the idea at her ass being under fire because she wanted James crushed. "Fine." She kept her answer elusive, because she wanted to prove that this wasn't going to scare her. "As long as I know that you aren't double-crossing me."

But she _doesn't_ know that, she's just stating it to make it sound like she has the upper hand. Duble shook his head. "We are very serious about our operation. Double-crossing someone as wealthy as you would make for a grand loss on our part." _No it wouldn't,_ he bluffed that last part. "Especially since we're dealing with a famous person."

"He's not that hard to keep tabs on like say, I dunno, Ambrose or something." Rebecca looked down at the button on her pants, fingering it at the mere mention of _that man's_ name. Heavy distaste on her part was oozing out of her tongue.

"What is that supposed to imply?"

Rebecca almost jumped at how fast Duble _caught_ what she said. His voice was _really_ sharp with that question, she needed to remember that she's dealing with someone with an IQ _considerably_ higher than hers. "I'm saying that James is not someone who has so much to keep himself safe-"

"We already know your hate for Ambrose." Duble said, cutting to the chase. "If you think you, or _we_ can even do so much as _touch_ him, you're wrong. And to simply track him would require funds way out of your net worth, way into the _billions_." The idea itself would make Andrea and the superboss of the syndicate quake, knowing that Mr. _Sarashina_ was a technological powerhouse. Yes, even the big bad criminals would have no choice but to fear and succumb to him and Rose Corp.

...Well, maybe not the superboss. He himself wouldn't really tremble out of _fear_ if he saw Ambrose again. That is something Duble, and the others aside from Andrea, do not know about.

"I _know_ that."

"Then do not compare _him_ with _your_ main target. You're getting too greedy." Duble chuckled. " _Stay in your lane._ "

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah yeah _sure_." Rebecca shook her head. "I'm off."

Duble made a sound of agreement, and he hung up accordingly. Rebecca stared down at her phone, and deleted the anonymous number from her contacts. She leaned forward on her countertop and took a moment to process the information she just got. She only needed _one_ contractor to deal her slow cards, not _two_. Whoever this person was, they wanted to destroy her property. Of _course_ they would want her to backpedal on trying anything alongside them.

She sighed. The doctor _promised,_ not vowed, _promised_ that she would not take that incident to heart. Vow is too strong of a word that she can't live by, even if it's more appropriate.

Rebecca picked up her phone and scrolled down her contacts, skipping past 'God' and going to Irene. She waited for her to pick up and was immediately greeted with 'Hey bestieeee!'

"Hey girl! How you doing over there? How's Zamasu?"

"He's actually not home right now." Irene shook her curls. "But I'm doing good, hun. Just finished eating a full, warm meal."

An ode to the fact that Zamasu always wanted her cooking but never admitted it. The redhead giggled. "Aww man, tell him I said hi! I haven't said much to him in a while."

"No problem." Irene almost sing-songed that reply.

Suddenly, Rebecca dared to place a jack on their conversation. "How's James?"

"Oh he's, doing very well." Irene said, a little less hyper than she did. Rebecca smirked. "I know he's busy out there with his coach, he just sent me a picture of his renovated indoor court."

"Really?"

"Well, I _asked_ him to."

"Oh…" Rebecca feigned a thoughtful giggle. "You're something else, Irene." Her gaze went downwards momentarily before she popped a question that's been sitting in her mind. "Listen, Irene; there is this party that's taking place and many rich people are gonna be in it."

"Rich people?"

"Mm-hmm." Rebecca nodded. "I wanted to invite you in, since it's technically open house."

An open-house party was the more refined, fancier term for a party where you get shitfaced and either puke somewhere, do dumb shit, or end up fucking someone you don't even know.

"When is it?"

"Liiiiike… two, three-ish weeks from now." Rebecca smirked, bringing Irene's boyfriend back up. "You can invite James if he wants to come."

Because Rebecca, despite her hate, _really wanted_ him to come along _on his own terms_. You know, it's a party; people have reckless fun at parties…

"I meaaaan." This is the part where Irene sighed; surprisingly hesitant."I think he's really busy-"

"Irene, you know James." Rebecca laid her hand out. "If he even hears the word 'party', he's gonna wanna join. _And_ it's open house." Rebecca shook her head in delicious thought as if Irene was right in front of her. " _Lots_ of really expensive wine and beer and food…"

Her hand was still out. Irene started at her wall, pensive. "Girl, you know what, you're right. Baby's definitely gonna want to come."

It was as if a foresighted deal was made just now, except Irene had no idea about it. At least not yet. "You bet! Oh, Ollie and Loki said hi too!"

"I actually don't hear them right now." Irene raised a brow. "Are they asleep?"

"...Yes." The doctor sheepishly smiled. "But they would if they were awake." She moved stuff around on her countertop. "I gotta go and call France, tell him that I'm finally back. I'll see you later girl!"

"Bye-bye!" Irene waved, even though Rebecca wasn't there, and she hung up. The artist looked down at her phone, a bit excited because she hadn't really been to a legit party since her art exhibition. Not to mention she's made _quite_ the cash off of it, she'd have no problem getting a real expensive dress for this occasion. She might have to ask Lexi to give her pointers… and maybe even a dress from the latest _Rose_ catalogue-

She might be pushing it. Some of the best dresses there are hundreds of thousands but 'ey, it's a rich people party. She has enough dough to flaunt it off.  
She heard noise, as if something was playing from a phone, in her dining room. It was sudden; her phone was right next to her and that made her jump, so it couldn't be hers. How the hell could there be noise in her dining room when she lived alone-

"Oh." The afro-haired woman blinked. "Zamasu?"

Did she just call him by his name? The Kaioshin was intently watching something, he was walking out of the dining room with his eyes _glued_ to the screen, you would think he would quickly answer to _that_. So Irene took to hopping up on her feet and quietly walking 'past' Zamasu. Once she was behind him, she turned around and took the most obnoxious peek at his screen.

That of course caught his attention, and he whipped his phone away from her eyes as if he was watching porn. "Excuse you?!"

"Oh my _god_ …" Irene's hands slapped against her cheeks. "This is the first time I saw you use your phone for entertainment!"

It _was_ the first time he used his phone for entertainment, he always assumed since they were inherently computers themselves, that they were only used as avenues for knowledge. Then he remember that he'd catch the guys and girls laughing at their phones many times and felt kind of stupid but again, he's still coming to understand the extent of technology here. "Uh huh..."

"Are you _watching_ Mr. Sarashina there?"

" _N-no!"_ Zamasu literally held his phone behind his back, _obviously_ guilty. Yes, he was watching videos of Ambrose from around 11 years ago. This was the time where the engineer was a contemporary singer, he had done so between the ages and 19 and 21. He heard an audio clip of a beautiful, smooth younger voice and when he read that the owner of _that_ voice was _Ambrose_... this God spent the past hour and a half watching his interviews and live performances.

 _Eleven years ago…_ and yet looking at Ambrose's younger, 19 year old self, Zamasu could swear that these were recorded within the past three years; Ambrose had not changed _one_ bit, minus the fact that his hair was a bit shorter. Back then, it had passed his chest and fluttered gracefully around his mid back. Much of his eccentric fashion style didn't change; he wore slightly heeled shoes just as much as he did now. Zamasu was entranced sitting in the outskirts of North City hearing the man's voice, and watching him dance because _oh boy_ , Ambrose apparently loved to dance.

There was not one live performance Zamasu watched where the engineer _wasn't_ grooving to the beat. If it wasn't dancing or outright spinning (in which Zamasu couldn't comprehend how Ambrose could spin so damn fast in like two-inch heels), he would watch Ambrose walk or stand and move his feet naturally to the sound of his own music, which in our tastes would resemble a range of Arabic, Disco, Nu-Jazz and Tejano music. He had the natural talent of a singer _and_ a dancer; being able to balance his voice with the movement of his own body, it was almost like watching a completely different person. Up until he would see the way Ambrose would smile when there was a bridge in his songs where he'd dance, like he was really feeling it, he knew damn well that was the same person he kissed four days ago.

He felt his lips tingle a bit at the thought of that night; it would have seemed that he pushed the incident out of his head, but that was a lie. He would catch himself thinking about how close and warm Ambrose's body felt, even with the knee-length trenchcoat he wore, and how beautiful his eyes looked against the moonlight. And how he smiled before Zamasu pressed his lips against his, and how this idiot laughed at him for not understanding why he went a little overboard. Would he ever kiss Ambrose again?

...That question is not to be answered aloud yet but… Zamasu would bet that he'd do so again.

"Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin blinked out of his thoughts only to see Irene holding him by his right shoulder. "Why are you touching me?"

"You turned your head so fast that I thought you'd get whiplash, man. Chill out, I'm not judging you for watching him; he's hot and talented as hell." Irene smiled. She remembered being in high school, and having her female friends _fawn_ over this guy and his smooth and sweet voice even though they couldn't understand a word he said in certain songs since he is _overwhelmingly_ multilingual. Rebecca actually did not have much a taste for the genre Ambrose produced, but when she first heard it she listened to it casually.

"You ought not to." Zamasu said, he paused the video and turned his phone off. "How was your flight?"

He didn't ask that out of any kind of care, he just wanted to detract her from speaking about his newfound guilty pleasure. Ambrose and chocolate; both his staple guilty pleasures now. "It was okay, you could have been there to make things more open."

He raised a brow. "Open?" And then he became skeptical. "What do you mean by that?"

She shrugged. "I meant what I said." With that, the woman turned around whipping her hair in the process, a move that Zamasu _oh so_ despised. "Rebecca said hi, by the way. I called her not too long ago."

When Irene said Rebecca's name, Zamasu's thoughts _instantly_ went to her two canine children. He should see to them tomorrow. "Hmm…" He left the general area of the dining room and stood just before the living room, against the kitchen divider. _It's been… a while since I even spoken with her_ , not that he had anything to say because Rebecca would be the one initiating the talking, but he'd recently felt that she had been retracting again. Now that he thought about it, when was the last time Rebecca _didn't_ push herself away from other people?

He vaguely recalled her being around Irene a lot more when she and James fought. _Of course_ he could imagine the reason behind her support to be petty, since her relationship with James formerly was nothing short of a 'warm body to sleep with'. When Irene and James were not close, that was the only time she was super elated to spend time with anyone.

He didn't think much of it. He imagined it was over petty issues and nothing more.

"As for James?" The Kaioshin asked, turning around to see Irene walking past him. He noted how her shoulders seemed to stiffen.

Her answer was plain though. "He's fine. He's at practice right now."

Irene's timbre was pressing, like she wanted Zamasu to believe that. And she _was_ right, James was finishing practice around the time she had texted him with _great concern_ over where he was and what he was doing, and who he was with.

"Huh." A light frown formed on the Kaioshin's face. "Okay then."

"Why ask?"

"Why wouldn't I ask?" Zamasu shrugged. "I just wanted to know."

Irene noticeably dialed back on her pressing attitude. That's weird, normally her boisterousness would progress but she seemed to be more aware of it. "You have a phone you know. You can always ask him."

"Is that what you did?" Zamasu was _quick_ to connect the dots as to why she was so curious about him asking of her boyfriend; he instantly figured that she was was starting to become a bit too obsessive, and her dialing back was to spin the nosy narrative back on _him_.

"What do you mean?"

"Is that what you did." He repeated himself. "Did you ask him where he was, or did he tell you?"

She furrowed her brows. "Why does it matter?"

"I just want to know." Zamasu repeated. "It is a simple yes or no question."

"Zamasu." Irene plopped down on her couch, as if to mask the fact that she was getting uncomfortable. "You're getting nosy all of the sudden."

"Is that not how you are with James?" He raised both of his brows, not willing to dance around the topic because James w _as_ his _boy_. "I can already tell you've been overly possessive with him. I thought things were straightened out between you two." He didn't give Irene room to rebuke, even if she sat up in her seat and opened her mouth. "James has probably said it more than once; you and him are together. There is no third party involved, and you hovering over his every move shows that you do not trust him as much as you say you do."

Maybe it was because of that prancy whorish Jean who tried to fight and do naughty things with him, and Irene's stick-my-head-in-God's-phone attitude that caused him to suddenly wanna _check_ the hell out of the princessy artist in front of him. He hasn't been around James in a while, but out of all things he could recount, he knew damn well that James was honest.

"You're just assuming things." Her bitter voice cut through the air, _proving him the fuck right._ "Of course you'd take the side of James since you hate me so much, but I do trust him, and I know he's not cheating on me."

 _She was taking this personally_. Zamasu stayed calm. "Then why get needlessly pushy over a simple question I asked?"

"Are you doing this to get a rise out of me?" Irene was pissed now; why did Zamasu feel the need to shit on her like this? Did he really think that everything had to be his business? "I know you're here to learn about my species, but riling me up over your silly suspicions ain't gonna do shit for you."

 _Oooh girl,_ he refrained… _refrained_ , from smacking the fuck outta her. He genuinely wanted to get through to her thick skull on this subject, and if he got angry as well it wouldn't do anything even if she wanted to piss him off by lowballing him and making him leave.

Level headed, he pushed past her foolishness. "I am not trying to anger you. I'm pointing out the obvious, because I know this would be annoying to James as well. He isn't cheating on you, he never did." And _then_ he decided to be petty. "You getting brash enough, to even insult _me_ , shows that you're still insecure about your partner. If he didn't want you, he would have left you. Simple at that."

Vouching for someone's feelings was kinda hard for the Kaioshin to do, he may have been a little too blunt _and truthful_ towards her right now. Irene was silent, mostly because she didn't know what to say, and also because she was questioning why Zamasu felt the need to defend James so badly, as if the man was in danger or some shit…

"Can you go upstairs now?" She was suddenly exasperated, all the fire and fury in her face died out _that_ quickly. Zamasu was seriously expecting her to double the boldness he displayed, maybe insult him even more. But she'd relent; she was defeated, but didn't want to admit it.

"Hmmph." He swiftly turned around and took the normal person approach, actually walking up the stairs this time. He knew he hit a deep nerve in her with that last sentence, because while James was really nice, he wasn't someone to dance around bullshit. Like Jay, if he didn't like something he got rid of it; Irene is not _entitled_ to stay with him, and deep down she knows that but does not want to fathom that at all.

Well, to the Kaioshin, it was pretty _obvious_. Such goes for every relationship; if needed, the person has the right to leave you.

Plopping down onto his bed, he sighed and lingered on how James was doing. It had been in the back of his mind to check on the basketball player more and more, and he couldn't put a finger as to why. He knew that there were people after him, but as of lately they haven't directly went after him. The only thing he could recount was the EMP near Adrian's home, and that was _nowhere_ near James. He would reckon that his close circle had his back no matter what.

If not all, then most of them definitely did...

 **[][][][][]**

Why the hell was he shaking?

His shift was over, or rather it had been over for almost an hour now, yet Ethan decided to stay. _Why_ did he decide to stay? Because over time he had became highly invested, entertained, by the amount of thinking he had put into this one theory thing he came up with.

Here's what happened; one night, just around a month ago, Ethan could not sleep. He didn't have work early the next day, but he still stayed up until around 3 in the morning _reading_ about quantum probabilities. That was the kindest way to define it; such was a branch of quantum physics that a select few of people even try to delve in. Since one is dealing with _really friggin' small_ quantities and really fast movements of masses and objects, to crunch numbers down with accuracy rather than precision is a terribly difficult task to do. Quantum probabilities is where you, you know, find the probability of stuff to happen in tiny, tiny physics.

So this one late at night search turned into random binge fests, if he could call it that; he started gravitating towards _everyone's_ favorite topic in all mathematic history: _proofs._ He stumbled upon this one very popular, already solved statement called the Peroesce Theorem where Peroesce states that there is a time in which a magnet accelerator changes its charge. Magnet accelerators were created just shy of 50 years ago, their conception birthed the superconductor roads that allowed all modern cars to hover above the ground. Ethan found it incomplete; while the proof states that there _exists_ a time where a magnet accelerator's core conductor changes, Ethan wanted to figure out at _what_ time this reversal could take place.

He spent nearly an entire month reading, writing, and staring at his laptop screen and newfound notepad piecing together everything he possibly could with this proof, right before he started cracking down with his thought process. Every single day on his free time, he'd find himself reading on how magnets worked, how positive and negative charges move between one another (they're at a point in science where they are able to reverse and 'move' charges), and how Peroesce had made it a point that this was only to mark an opposite charge and not just a nullified or neutral charge. After countless hours of sitting in a cafe or on his bed, Ethan came to an odd conclusion: Peroesce was right, but the number itself _wasn't even rational_.

Given the probability that Peroesce used, Ethan plugged in multiple signatures of modern, mock magnet accelerators and found that the majority of them turned out to be decimal numbers. If he removed the decimals from the equation, and rightfully rounded up or down, the number would _always_ be even. To signify a change in something, the simplest of binary iterations would have opposites happening at odd numbers; say something is black, and it turns white at the first iteration, that marks one, then it goes back to black which is two. _Always_ odd.

Ethan had realized that technically, neutrality in magnets could be counted as a 'change' in this probability, which explains the even number maybe. But the _decimal_ made no sense, it could only mean there was an error in Peroesce's theorem.

Or maybe there was an error in how he was adding it, but he's become quite well versed in math, and he went over everything multiple times.

He wasn't deterred from this; he decided to keep tabs on this anomaly while repeatedly testing signatures like they were actual accelerators. He reworked one of his made-up formulas to suit the problem so it can 'fit' neutrality as a third option. Another batch of many hours went by again…

He remembered finally staring at all 140 _scatterbrained_ papers, not including the post it notes on each and every one which would probably make this entire thing reach the _thousands_. He had figured it out; a magnet accelerator will only see a direct, polar change in iterations _exactly after_ 524,288. Meaning, once it spins for the 524,288th time, any time after that will guarantee a charge reversal. Don't mind the giant ass number, these things spin _fast_.

It was a start on Ethan's brain turning cogs that he never knew were there in the first place. He looked down at the now well printed, coherently written pages of his _own_ statement and proof. He used a small font size, but it _still_ managed to reach around 45 pages with his equations and all down. As rudimentary as it was, it was like a treasure to him, something he once felt so damn proud of at 4 in the morning. So why was he afraid?

Because he wanted to show it to his boss.

It was like college essays all over again. He had polished it with typed out words and cut out pictures of the written work he's done. He reread it more than like ten times to really solidify his claim, and even with the _reiterative_ clutch in his attitude, he _still_ could not bring himself to show _Ambrose_ what he's been doing.

The smartest man in the world right now was in his large office. Ambrose's IQ was estimated somewhere in the far 500s; Ethan's was probably a _fourth_ of that at best. This scribble of bullshit in his hands would probably make the _eyes_ of the supergenius vomit. It wasn't even in his hands, it was still on his desk because he was so afraid of picking it up a misjudging its worth. Five, ten, _twenty_ minutes passed and he just sat there _debating_ on whether or not he should go.

Finally, on shaky knees, the admin rose and took hold of his 45 pages. He scratched his chin nervously and slowly walked towards the intimidating, spacious office. In all honesty, he absolutely loved how beautiful Ambrose's office was; there was a beautiful view of loads of gardens and the open walkway with people walking all about. One time Ethan was walking through the halls which had glass walls, and he didn't realize that there buses, fucking _buses_ around this place. These busses weren't citywide, in fact, their transit all belonged to Rose Corp and are exclusively for Rose Corp use since this building is like a mile long.

Ethan is totally distracting himself right now thinking about buses.

"Ambrose?" His mouth worked before his mind did, the admin saw Ambrose sitting comfortably reading something. At least he wasn't on the phone, Ethan probably would've wasted a perfectly good phone call.

Golden eyes looked up from his book, and Ethan felt the last bit of confidence he had _booked_ out of him. Ambrose gave him that well-known kind smile, not setting down his book yet. "Yes, Ethan?"

Ethan was still by the door. It wasn't closed or anything, he was just… standing there awkwardly. Even Ambrose had to gesture for him to come in. He took a breath, pushing aside the nervousness to speak. "I've been looking at a thing." He took a step closer, hiding the papers behind his back. "The Peroesce Theorem."

Ambrose's sharp brows raised. "Really?"

Ethan nodded. "And I thought of this… thing, I dunno how to call it. You know what his statement is already." At that, Ambrose nodded. "He never exactly states at what time this can happen, so uhh… I spent some time trying to figure that out."

He actually didn't expect to see Ambrose look impressed. What Ethan proposed isn't even that hard, but he'd rather see his new admin try his hand at mathematics rather than constantly seeing himself as an idiot compared to the likes of him, Chandler, Evan and Avery. He wanted to see what Ethan could come up with, even though Ethan seriously looked like he was going to run away. To Ethan, and the _majority of people_ though, Ambrose's facial expressions were oftentimes hard to read; you couldn't tell if he really liked the idea of something _before_ he saw it.

The trillionaire placed his book, _finally_ , on his desk. He gave Ethan a warm smile with a slight giggle because the 23 year old was so stiff. "Don't just stand there; let me see it."

Ethan looked elsewhere for a moment before unsheathing his papers from behind him. He handed it to Ambrose and his boss took it with delicate hands. _Ambrose's hands are really pretty_ , Ethan mused; he needed something to distract him so he decided to take to looking out the wall windows all around the room. Only seven seconds had passed and he felt nervous again, nervous enough to flicker his eyes towards Ambrose expectantly. The wealthy man wasn't smiling, but he wasn't looking in distaste; he was really reading and looking at everything Ethan wrote with concentrated eyes.

He shouldn't have fucking looked. That sight alone just _ended_ him.

Ambrose stayed silent while he read over the papers Ethan produced. Ethan took one step back before he retracted, feeling bad for making his boss read something stupid. "I mean uhh- it's not really anything. I just kinda uhh… put it together." Ethan scratched the back of his head while looking away, because the sight of your boss reading something you just kinda… pulled together is intimidating. After a short while he started turning around, not hearing anything from Ambrose and thinking on behalf of how much of a waste of time this was for the trillionaire.

"Ethan."

The assistant turned around, seeing that Ambrose had completely went through the _forty five_ page theorem explication in less than five minutes. "What's on these forty five sheets of paper alone…" The supergenius boss placed the paper on the desk very delicately, which caught the eyes of Ethan. Ambrose looked him dead in the eyes. "Is an idea worth millions."

Ethan blinked once, twice, and then he leaned forward with his eyes narrowed and brows raised, because that's a _big_ number. "W-... M-millions?"

"Yes." Ambrose took the papers again, and didn't even bother to staple them. Instead, he slid the papers into a shiny black and gold outlined outlined paper protector. Ethan's eyes were like saucers, that shit probably costs more than his jacket. "Do not come to me with something like this, only to say that it isn't really _anything_." His boss looked back at him again, and Ethan was trying not to look him in the eyes. This man was so _intimidating_. "Understood?"

Despite that, Ambrose still had a soft, abiding voice. He didn't get angry at Ethan, he didn't embarrass him, he didn't even bat an eye at the 'gibberish' that Ethan wrote. Instead, he placed the papers in a sheet protector, and handed them back to his employee. Ethan nodded quickly. "Y-yes, sir." He took the papers, and left the large office room. His boss continued to watch Ethan's unconfident gait until he reached his own desk before packing away everything he needed to leave.

Ethan on the other hand felt like the biggest exhale was out of his chest, but at the same time he felt weirdly pressured; what he wrote… could cost _that_ much? Well, he knew that there were many theorems and statements that _had_ price tags to them, and any possible discovery in the quantum physics field was of no cheap currency. Ethan though he was just being arrogant to think that his line of thinking made sense but once again, he underestimated himself.

He always does that shit too. Even Terry tells him to bring his shit up sometimes.

Ethan took his briefcase, dropped his phone in his jacket pocket and turned to see Ambrose still sitting, but _looking_ at him. Ethan waved kindly and Ambrose returned the gesture with a nod. He was real close to leaving when his boss called him out again.

"Ethan."

A slight uptone in his timbre this time. Ethan turned around. "Yes."

There was a pause. Ambrose was like thirty feet away but those intense golden eyes still burned into him. The swiveling of his chair stopped. "Hold on to that."

...Did Ambrose already figure out that Ethan was going to scrap his own work and forget about it? Ethan blinked but he did nod. "Okay..." And with that, he left.

He went down the elevator, saying bye to several different people that he became acquainted with, and walked to the western parking lot to get his car.

His drive home was filled with racy thoughts that kept going back to his proof. Now that he got the validation from his own boss, he felt like he needed to dig deeper into his work. He only figured out one single truth in that jumbled mess of thoughts, he was certain that there were more cases that would break his hypotheses. He was home before he even realized it, and he decided to healthily push aside his math addiction for a moment to call Terry.

"Terrier!"

The other end was met with silence for a moment. "Really now?"

"Yes." Ethan laughed. "How are you doing over there?"  
"Oh, I'm good, I've been springy as of late." Terry said. "How about you?"

"...I spent many hours trying to add to a proof I read about one night."

"Nerd."

"Uh _'scuse me_ , _doctor_." Ethan raised a finger.. "You have _no room_ to talk."

"Right, right, okay." Terry waved his hand before tapping it against his table, glancing out of his home office. "You just got off work, right?"

"Yup, I'm in my car right now." Ethan placed a hand on his wheel. "Hey, listen; so… one of my friends at Rose Corp told me about this one party with a bunch of rich people. Like only those in the top ten percent or are specialized people know about it."

It wasn't like he was leaking this information; Terry is a doctor, a well respected one at that. The guy makes around 200k Zent annually, he wouldn't be surprised if Terry was invited.

"Ah yes, I heard of it. I dunno if I would go, though." Terry shrugged. "I mean, I'm not _against_ it but...I for one won't be drinking recklessly. And that's what people in those parties do."

Ethan never been to a high class, rich people party but he could imagine that with the expensive tastes in wine and beer and such. But at the same time, he can't imagine classy wealthheads getting _smack_ drunk. He imagined them sitting in fancy restaurant floors with million dollar chandeliers and insanely expensive appetizers. "That's... that's something."

Terry laughed. "Why? Are you invited?"

"Uhh-" Ethan scratched the back of his head. "I'm not like… a millionaire or anything really."

"But you're friends with millionaires, and billionaires. And your boss is a _trillionaire_."

Ethan was _well aware_ that he was currently working with some members of the top one percent, and _his_ earnings as of now are like what they all make in less than an hour. Every time Avery walked into the joint office he would feel like a peasant; this guy would wear rhodium-finished watches and shoes, and let's all _forget_ about his boss…

Actually no, _do_ forget about him. Ambrose always managed to pick out the most casual, 'non-expensive' looking clothing and you'd think 'wow, that looks cheap for his making'... And then you realize that the dress shirt he's wearing is made out of vicuna…

And it's embellished, so that shirt might cost like 400k alone.

"Well like-" Ethan shrugged loosely. "I'm not part of your millionaire club, though!"

"You work at Rose Corp. You're _on your way_ to joining our 'club'. It's not even a club, either." Terry chuckled. "I would pardon your invite, since I wouldn't have anyone to go with. Why not take you with me?"

Terry should be Ethan's _best_ friend right now.

"R-really?!"

"Yeah, why not?" Terry shrugged. "But Ethan, listen; this is a rich person party…" He knew Ethan wanted to go, so he skipped reassuring his claim.

Ethan was still processing the idea of being a part of something so… _huge_ in valor, it took him a couple of seconds to reply. "Uh huh?"

"You _do_ have to dress your very best, you know." Terry raised a finger like he was talking to the 23 year old in person. "You can't walk in with that one dress suit outfit you got from some mall."

Imagine being so rich that you refer to anything that isn't customary as _some mall clothing._ "But I don't have funds for some super duper rich stuff!" Ethan said.

Terry straightfaced. "Really? Raw estimate the money you have in your wallet right now."

Ethan had a few hundred in his wallet. He always did direct deposit, and he completely forgone the habit of checking how much money he had. He pulled it up quickly and could have blushed at how not-middle class he suddenly was. This amount was what he had _after_ paying all his bills and expenses. "Like… twenty thousannnnd…"

"That's not bad." Terry snapped a finger. "You've never been to any of the classified designer stores, I can tell."

"What's _that_ supposed to mean?" The admin narrowed his eyes.

"It _means_ you don't know where to look for high-end clothing." Terry served him, in the friendliest way possible. "One day I'll drive you out to Nilan, and we'll spend a day just surfing for you to wear something."

Ethan smiled, he felt honored in being able to shop in one of the most fashionable cities in the world. West City's Nilan was part of the top ten, the top fives all belong to cities in Efilia. He knew this party was looming quite close, so they couldn't fly to a different country to get _actual_ richy clothing. Plus Ethan was too unconfident to be walking around in something that costs more than the text logs he had for college, how much more bougie could he be flying out of Tycho for an _outfit_?

"And you sure I could walk in? Don't you need like a pass?"

"Those who are invited know the owners, man." Terry said. "Joinings are fine, as long as you know one of more of those invited. It's not that serious, trust me."

This was like getting told a dirty secret. "Oh…" Ethan blinked. "Wow, alright so… how about like tomorrow?"

"Work."

"Day after tomorrow?"

A pause. And then Terry answered. "Yup."

"Day after tomorrow it is!" Ethan raised his arm happily but forgot he was in his car, so he loudly bumped his hand onto the ceiling. "Ow…"

Terry shook his head, muttering 'clutz' under his breath. "I think it's time for you to actually go home. We'll plan later, and also… I'll be doing the driving."

"I can't just follow close by behind you?" Ethan stood up from his car and closed the driver's door, locking his car in the process.

Terry made a sound. "You ever been to Nilan? The drivers there don't play around."

They don't. They'll cut you off Manhattan style with no remorse or pity.

"Right… Alright fine, you'll drive." Ethan said. "I'll see you later man."

"See ya at it, Ethan." Terry pointed cooly, before hanging up his phone and looking at the contacts screen. He placed his phone down and got up to look out the window in thought; his mind kept glossing over _that redheaded woman_ again, because ever since he got into retrospect over her conflicts in the past four months, multiple things were not adding up. He personally didn't see a reason for Rebecca to shade him over, even though they both literally work in the _same_ hospital and he genuinely cared for her, there was nothing in his timbre that should make her act sketchy to him. Unless she thought that he was involved with them, but even that would make no sense; why push him away when he was trying to help her the most?

Terry shook his head. The water was not clean, there was _definitely_ something ary going on.

 **[:::::::::]**

It seriously looked like no one had ever vandalized Adrian's home. He and Jay took to sleeping rather than spending the day awake like normal people, and when he woke up he went around to take a good look at everything they owned.

"Oh man." Adrian looked around his home. "I'm almost convinced that what Zamasu told us didn't even happen."

"Right?" Jay smiled, it was kind of the God to step in and keep them both from having heart attacks, not to mention Ambrose's help in re-activating their electricity. He plopped down on the sofa. "I'm hungry."

Adrian looked down at him. He was standing just shy of the kitchen's entrance, and his friend sat across from him. "Go eat."

Jay gave him an expectant look. "...But I'm tired."

"Bro." Adrian tilted his head. "Don't tell me you want me to cook for you?" There was a really long pause because Jay was still staring at him, and the smile on his face was getting bigger. " _No_ , I'm not 'bout to-"

"Remember that one time when you got me really mad?"

There _was_ no 'one time'. "No, forget about 'that one time', don't try to bribe me into doing shit for you." The curly haired man did not mind Jay's big ass smile.

"But you're my friend." Jay shifted so that he was facing Adrian, holding onto the back of the sofa. "Friends help each other."

" _Yeah_ but I'm hungry too." Adrian left the living room and went into the kitchen. Within a few minutes, he heard Jay's footsteps.

Jay walked in and instantly scrutinized what he saw. "You're making yourself a pie of pizza?!"

"Ummm, I'm _hungry_." Adrian smirked at the look Jay gave him. "Besides, it's not like you can't have a slice."

" _Good._ " The shorter man crossed his arms and sat on the countertop, watching his friend sprinkle herbs onto the pizza's surface. He sat up when he felt his phone ringing, and saw that it was Mace. " _'Oy_."

"Jay." Mace said, but his voice didn't have a shred of that playful assholeness it normally has. He was _serious_. "Are you alone right now?"

"Well I'm at home." Jay said. "What's wrong?"

"Have you checked your car recently?"

Jay blinked, then he frowned, and then he blinked again; he didn't drive or anything when they first came, rather he and Adrian had a chauffeur instead. He got off the countertop and looked outside, thinking there was something up. "It's in the lot, though."

"No it's not."

"What do you _mean_ it's not?!" Now he started to freak out. Meanwhile, Mace retracted all the seriousness he had with a sheepish smile but he didn't let that show in his voice yet.

"It isn't there."

Jay was already starting to fidget. "Why isn't it there?!"

 _Now_ his humor bled through his voice. "Because I'm using it."

Jay _visibly_ deflated from anxiety, to straight up annoyance. He shook his head and took a deep breath. "Why'd you do this to me?"

"It's fun hearing you panic." Mace chuckled. "How was your flight, man?"

" _Ugh."_ Jay rolled his eyes far back. _Asshole._ "It was _fine_ , just don't do that shit again. Seriously, you know I love my baby."

"You can barely drive."

"Fuck off, I love it still." Jay's driving skills were like Adrian's if Adrian was blindfolded. He literally has a racerback car just for keeps sake because you can't fully trust him behind the wheel. Not even Lexi trusts him, sometimes. "How are you? Other than getting me scared…"

Mace snorted. "I'm at home right now. I actually just left not long ago." He looked down at his hand. "I got word that your house was tarnished. Zamasu came over and explained the entire thing to me, and I figured you've been relaxing for too long and need to be frizzled up a bit."

Another eye roll from the younger cousin. " _Why thanks_." He can't stand Mace's ass sometimes; just because he's got a job that requires his brain cogs to turn as fast as Volt, meanwhile Jay's brain cogs only turn when he wants to make a new song. "Nothing weird has happened, like with the special crime stuff right?"

Mace twirled his pen in his hand. "Well, not of your immediate concern, but they have been dying down lately."

Someone else apparently was sitting with Mace in his house. Jay could hear booted footsteps. "Who is there with you?"

"I am." Chandler sat down right next to Mace and took his phone from the director's ear. "Heyooo."

Mace snatched his phone back. "How the hell did you hear that?"

"Why do you keep underestimating my abilities as an AI?" Chandler gave him a look.

Jay blinked. "Who's that?"

"Oh uhh…" Mace placed his hand over his phone. "Chandler, he doesn't know you."

A light shrug from the AI. "Well, introduce me then."

"This is Chandler, one of my good friends who used to work closely with the governments." Mace briefed.

"Oh… _wait a minute_." Jay narrowed his eyes. "Are you that AI dude who's part of Rose Corp?"

Now Jay had recognized him. He had seen Chandler several times in some videos of Rose Corp, or from their workers' Hash videos. Hash is basically Desna's Twitter and Youtube combined. Chandler also had a Hash account himself, and from what he recalled, Chandler was _funny_.

"Yep." Chandler leaned back. "I already know who you are, I don't mean to be creepy. Your cousin has quite the mouth."

Jay couldn't agree any harder. " _Tell me about it_."

"Hey, the both of you!" Mace snapped his fingers, and pointed at Chandler. " _Don't engage him._ "

"Mace, shut up." Jay said. "Nice to meet you, Chandler."

"Nice to meet you too." The AI smiled. "Mace had something to propose to you."

"Oh right." Mace sat up. "I was thinking of inviting you guys to my house, and a few others I know. You know, for a little kick-it type deal."

"Really?" He wasn't against the idea, so he called out to Adrian who was now in the living room. "Adrian!"

"What?"

"Mace wants us to go to his tea party."

Mace squinted at his cousin's wording, even though Adrian couldn't hear him. "It's a _kick it session_ , you nut."

"Bro, hell the fuck yeah, I haven't seen that guy in over a month!" Adrian laughed and peeked his head at Jay and made a face. "Tell 'im _yes_."

Jay went back to the person in his phone. "He's coming."

"Right, good." Mace nodded. "And also… get Zamasu too."

"Oh I'll ask him." Jay smirked. He knew Zamasu liked fine tastes, and Mace's loft was _classy_. That _heavily_ contrasted with how much of a nice asshole he is.

Or maybe it didn't, most assholes had posh tastes. _Hmm_.

"Good, good." Mace smiled. "That's all I wanted to call for."

"Right." Jay said, there was silence on both heads for about several seconds, a lingering question started growing in Jay's mind. "...Mace?"

"Yeah?"

He looked at the ground, his toes twiddled together. "Can I get my car back though?"

There was pause on the other hand, and Jay could feel Mace's stupid fucking smirk. " _After you learn how to drive properly."_

He'll remember to smack Mace upside the head the next time he sees him.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Rebecca finally speaks with one of the big faces of the dark syndicate, but she does not necessarily get the answer she wants. It was indeed Merkel who sent the bomb to her home, to lowkey kill a bird and its nest with one stone. The bird being Terry and the nest being Rebecca's home, huehue.**

 **Her skipping past 'God' or Zamasu in her contacts is analogous to that one line in Thriller (yes, MJ's birthday was around the week I wrote this… and I binged his songs lmao). He says '** _ **They will possess you, unless you change that number when you dial**_ **'. She could've called for help, and easily play the victim if she wanted to (kek), but she didn't. It is slowly, painfully sinking in her just how** _ **bad**_ **her decisions have become.**

 **...Oof.**

 **Also, I'd reference Ambrose's music, and dancing styles to that of Selena Quintanilla. If y'all know who that is I** _ **swear**_ **… she had moves down to the T, man. Also her personality just reminds me of him too; she was playful and sweet. RIP. His IQ is no bluff either. You have to be a crazy mastermind to run a multifaceted business worth trillions without a handler or a handling team. 500 seems about right given the amount of talents he fucking has, no boost.**

 **Keep in mind that Ethan is starting to pick up a knack for mathematical engineering. If you remember Regan Cornes; he was captured and subjected by deeper sectors of the dark syndicate because he was a very affluent lockman, so they used him as a fall guy to create and plant a rigged bomb. Just know that any accolades someone has to Rose Corp can either be extremely valuable, or terrifically dangerous to get to…** _ **ahem.**_

 **Y'all… Mace's house meet takes place on the same week of the 'rich people party'. The** _ **Magnificent Seven (minus James at first so it's six initially)**_ **are obviously gonna be there, and so far we know Ethan, Terry, Rebecca, Irene and James are going to that wealthy party. What could** _ **possibly**_ **go wrong?**

 **Well, a lot could.**

 **Bye Bye, see you all later lmao.**


	44. Beginning of An End

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 **Beginning of an End**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

A couple days ago Lexi landed into Tycho finally, and now she was about to wear some _exclusive_ attires for her business partner's new issue. As if this _wasn't_ a big deal on it's own, Ambrose told her that they would be taking photos at a studio in Efilia. This morning, she woke up and called a chauffeur to take her to South City's airport, where she was met with the trillionaire, Avery and his trusty bodyguards Frank and Andrew. They were both _huge_ dudes; these guys towered over her, but they were both nice and gentle despite their beefy builds. It seems like even his bodyguards had to walk around in style too; these guys weren't wearing plain black and white tuxedos; they had shiny velvet blue _sequin_ suits with alligator skin black loafers. Both their attires looked to be a million dollars a piece.

 _Geez_.

She had never been in a _classified_ , private jet before and shouldn't have been more than shocked when its interior looked like an entire living room set. There was a curved screen TV, working lights, water and all kinds of sweet things, not to mention the couches were so damn comfortable. Due to her excitement, she didn't sleep very well last night and Ambrose said that she could take a nap if she wanted to. The woman woke up from his hand gently tapping her shoulder, her hair all over her face, and she shot up only to apologize profusely for getting the smallest of makeup stains on the jet's couch. He ended up _having_ to assure her that it was _okay._

The drive to the studio was short and it was well in the afternoon in Locette, one of Efilia's biggest cities and also one of the beauty capitals in the world. The studio was _huge_ ; it was a special place specifically made for modeling photoshoots, and she was sat down on a chair while some _really famous stylists_ went jogging about. One was named Jodi; he was a world famous makeup artist whose worked on the highest selling models. Even _seeing_ him made her stomach curl anxiously, but once Ambrose had stepped in to greet him she had relaxed. These were all famous people, and Ambrose is over here cordially talking with them like they weren't big deals. It wasn't arrogance, but unlike her, it was easy for him to push past the fame and stature of a person. Jodi himself was really kind, she even spoke casually with him while he was touching up her face.

Lexi found herself getting accustomed to being around these wealthy names. She asked about how these kind of shoots are, and he told her they weren't difficult but she needed to be on her _best_ game today because they were gonna be posted on a billion-dollar catalogue, representing a _multi-billion_ dollar clothing line.

You bet she came with her A-game today. What do you think this is?

After Jodi had finished, he did his trademark wand-like wave with his brush, and moved out of the way for the young model to see the results. " _Et voila!_ "

"Oh… my god…" Her makeup was _beat for the Gods_ , when she took a look in the mirror she looked _absolutely_ stunning; there was no heavy liquid eyeliner, most of the accents on her eyes were complimented with mascara, and a sexy combination of black and orange eyeshadow. Never in her life has she toyed around with orange eyeshadow; the one Jodi used on her wasn't matte but rather shimmery, but _good lord_ … this was the type of makeup she was going to adorn for the next several hours. "It looks _so fucking good_ …" She was almost afraid to touch her face.

Okay okay, random plug; imagine if she sent a picture of what she looked like to Zamasu. Yeah, he'd bust one.

"I'm glad you like it dear." Jodi smiled. "I chose orange since the first piece you'd be wearing is very warm and orangey in hue."

"Really?" Lexi said. Normally, makeup artists who work for photoshoots weren't exactly told what the models would wear, so they would make the makeup ambiguous colors that would _vaguely_ suit the look.

"Mm-hmm." Jodi folded his hands. Someone else had knocked on the studio door just in time to get Lexi up and out for her first shoot. She thanked Jodi and left to go into her dressing room which _god fuck_ was filled with clothing that she swore was worth more than her house. Her first piece was hanging right in front of her; it was a shimmery orange bodysuit that not only reflected so nicely, but there were geometric _black diamond_ etchings around the waistline and shoulders. They were so small but black diamond was probably the most expensive mineral out there. A single carat costs around 15 thousand Zent because they were so hard to come by. The ombre orange heels were also studded with black diamonds.

Her fucking jaw dropped upon closer inspection at the rich minerals on her jumpsuit; they were all cut _cleanly_ , which meant each and every piece had to be at _least_ 20-carat. How was that even possible?!

There was a back sash that draped behind like a silken cape that was also in an autumn orange-brown ombre hue, and from the looks of it this outfit was going to _snatch_ her waist and hips. This thing had to be exclusive, there was no way this would be going in any department store, _ever_.

Lexi looked down at herself, and then at the suit, and then at herself again, and then looked to the mirror on her far right. Imagine if _Jay_ saw her in this; he would drool and die, probably. She had to wear _this_ masterpiece of an attire, hopefully not in front of the same man she was working with.

Otherwise, there'll be no doubt; she'll die too.

Zamasu touched base with Rebecca's living room. It had been a whole week since Irene had returned and like a non confrontational being, Irene chose to be mostly pay no heed to Zamasu. There was sparse interaction between the two, the only times the artist spoke to him was for food and… that's about it. She wouldn't even ridicule him like she normally does and it had him shaking his head.

A _single sentence_ was enough to shut this woman up. He can't imagine the insane breakdown she will have when James decides he's done with her bullshit. And he'll be right there watching, eating all of her chocolates and sipping all of his tea because he's fucking petty like that.

He had actually wanted to see how _her_ best friend is doing, unfortunately he'd come just in time to see that she wasn't home. He didn't figure that out because he sensed three beings in this mansion right now, and readily assumed that she was upstairs sleeping. Everything looked exactly as it did when he used to live here; the only difference was that there was this gaming console (he knew what it was because he read about it) sitting on the surface of the mount table. His ears perked at the sound of something jingling upstairs, and he turned to await whoever was making their way downstairs.

He almost cracked up seeing small Ollie _hopped_ down each and every step because he's too damn small to walk normally.

Ollie, once he barely even turned his head and got a _glimpse_ of a tall green father figure standing in the living room, awaiting his arrival, went _crazy_. Loud barks and happy, sprinting feet filled the room before he jumped up and into Zamasu's arms licking his face like he always used to. Zamasu couldn't help the warm laugh over the reunion, over all the stuff that happened over the past month he truly _missed_ his canine children. And now that his face was wet, he could tell Ollie greatly missed him too.

Ollie started barking louder, which grabbed the attention of the bigger and younger dog in the house. Loki came down the stairs very slowly, peeking his head down once he could see the living room. He saw Zamasu, and _booked_ his way to the middle of the step before jumping right the hell off its ledge and running at the God, practically _hugging_ both Zamasu and Ollie feverishly. The Kaioshin even had to put Ollie down to accomodate for the bigger dog.

"It's okay, it's okay, I'm here-" He could identify Loki's rather brash reaction to seeing him, and the almost growl-like sounds he kept making as he aggressively hugged him. The malamute almost sounded like he was crying- and yes, dogs can cry- and chuffing as if saying ' _You left us for so flipping long!'_ Zamasu refused to sit on the floor because he was sure they would both attack him for being away for too long.

And rightfully so, but he didn't want to get suffocated by two tongues and eight paws.

"I know you two are upset with me…" Literally, two correspondent barks were his response. Zamasu smiled, they were _adamant_. "But I am here now, and I'm not leaving anytime soon."

That made them quite down a bit, now that he earned their trust. Zamasu took to kneeling down, seeing how they both sat side by side politely waiting for him to speak. They were so well behaved…

"Are you two hungry?" Zamasu clasped his hands together. "What would you both like to eat?"

At that moment, he could hear a faucet turning off, followed by a door opening upstairs. He and the two dogs looked up and he anticipated to see Rebecca walk downstairs. Instead, the descending footsteps were coupled with a teenage boy's voice.

"Ollie, Loki, what's good with you guys? Why are you two barki-" Thomas stopped when he saw a strangely-clad _green skinned_ man looking up at him with the same amount of confusion he had right now. ". _..Uhh…_ "

Zamasu furrowed a brow at the younger man. He looked to be in his mid-teens; he was shirtless and wearing navy blue jogger pants. His eyes were as green as Rebecca's and his hair was a much darker red, almost brown even, and it was in a short, messy sidepart caused by him drying his hair with a small towel. He readily assumed that, due to his looks, he was Rebecca's younger brother that he _vaguely_ remembered the doctor referencing at one point. "Hello… are you Rebecca's brother?"

A slow, skeptical blink. "How do you know her?"

 _Understandable_ , it's not common to find someone like Zamasu in your older sister's house. "I am well acquainted with her."

Thomas had no reason to think Zamasu was out for harm, especially because _both_ Ollie and Loki seemed to look like they cooperated so well under the Kaioshin. But at the same time, given that whole surreal bomb situation… what if he was the one who tried to harm Terry? His eyes went to the dogs; What if this guy's able to mind control animals?

Thomas narrowed his eyes. "How do I know you're not lying?"

Zamasu blinked; there was no applicable way for him to _show_ Thomas that he was on good terms with Rebecca. He had to explain. "I was sent here to study upon this planet." A safe lie, midkey. It's a long story. "And I was introduced to her early on in my arrival. I mean no harm to her or you, I just missed these two and wanted to see them."

 _That was weird_ , he never personally _voices_ how he feels towards mortals, even though he was extending sentiment to two canines. That last sentence sounded really weird to say out loud.

Thomas looked between him and the dogs, and then tossed the towel against his shoulder. "The dogs never lie." He crossed his arms. "Ollie, Loki; you know this guy?"

Thomas almost jumped at how _exuberant_ their barks were at that question.

"Alright… okay, I believe you." He raised both hands and then pointed at Zamasu before coming completely downstairs, not bothered by the fact that he was shirtless. "To answer your question: name's Thomas, and yes I am her younger brother. Umm…" There was silence for a short while. He scratched the back of his head. "How… do you do?"

This became more awkward than Zamasu trying to speak in Ebonics. "I'm fine, thank you. And you? Do you not feel cold without a shirt?"

That was a mild translation for ' _why aren't you wearing a shirt?'._ Thomas shook his head. "Nah, I'm good. I just took a shower so I'm pretty toast." The fifteen year old pulled out his phone just to check the time and he sheathed it back.

It was at this moment Zamasu realized that his… friend circle? Can he call it that? Okay, his _associates_ were mostly in the young adult age group; four out of seven of them were from East City. They normally don't use as much slang as the younger generation did, and he would have to say of all the countries he's visited or listened to via videos, East City had the most colorful slang. He knew Thomas was saying that he was was warm after taking a warm shower, but he hadn't heard such a heavy dialect in so long.

"Did you want to see my sis?"

Zamasu looked back to the kid. "Actually yes. I haven't spoken much with her in awhile."

"You came out of clutch, man." Thomas said. It took Zamasu a moment to translate that. "She left for work earlier today."

He hadn't kept in mind what day it was today, but from what his mental calendar told him (and he wouldn't be wrong), today was the end of the weekend. Rebecca did not work on weekends. "Really?"

"That's what she told me." Thomas plopped down on her couch. "I wasn't listening, but I'm sure that's what she said."

It was riveting to see how _not_ reserved her younger brother was. "You ought to listen to your elders, then."

"It was 8 AM! I was 'sleep." Thomas shrugged. "Don't judge me."

Zamasu chuckled, bending down a bit to appease Loki wanting to be petted. "Is that your gaming device?" He pointed to the 'hexagon-looking thingy' on Rebecca's mounted stand.

As expected, Thomas did snort. "Yea it is." He smiled at the God as he went to sit down adjacent to the teen. Ollie and Loki literally _surrounded_ this man. "How old are you, man?"

Zamasu frowned. "Why does that matter?"

"You sounded like my granddad when you said 'gaming device'."

Zamasu gave the teen a look, which made Thomas giggle. "I'm in my three hundred thousand fifty's."

"Your _what_?" Thomas' face fell as Zamasu said the last three words. "You're three hundred thousand fifty-ish years old?"

A nod. Thomas shook his head in shock. "Are you like some sort of immortal being or some shit?"

" _Immortal_ is quite in my complex, for the likes of mortals like you." Zamasu explained. "I am a Shinjin. We are Gods of Creation in all universes."

Green eyes went wide. "Uni…verses?"

"Yes. There are twelve universes within this one multiverse. You inhabit the tenth, and me and my mentor are both observers of this very universe."

For Zamasu, this was bear minimum knowledge the high-rank Shinjin had, so it came out of his mouth nonchalantly. Thomas on the other hand looked elsewhere, like to his left and then his right, then he looked up and casted his gaze at the floor. He thought to himself, _I'm not high, am I?_

Zamasu blinked and straightfaced. "No you aren't high. I _actually_ exist."

"Did you just read my thoughts?!"

The look on Thomas' face and the way he jumped was real close to making Zamasu crack up. "Gods of Creation have telepathic abilities, yes."

Literally before Thomas had gotten to know Zamasu, the very first thoughts he had were _heavy_ roast-material. "Have you… been reading my thoughts this whole time?"

"No, not at all. It's not something that is autoimmune; I can switch it on and off whenever I want to." Zamasu was grateful for that too, at least he didn't see every thought every human being around has had. He could imagine their minds were more… guttery than his own.

"Oh… oh, okay good." Thomas exhaled.

That _didn't_ mean the Kaioshin was not intuitive enough to pinpoint what a person is thinking. "Why? Were you thinking of insulting me?"

" _N-no_ , no!" Thomas shook his hands out to Zamasu profusely. Loki and Ollie tilted their heads at their younger owner's strange behavior; they knew master Zamasu wouldn't hurt the kid but Thomas figured that since the blue and purple gi-clad green man said he was a _God_ , and can read his thoughts, that'd meant the Kaioshin could _blink_ Thomas out of existence. "I-I swear I wasn't going to insult you, _pleasedon'tkillmeIswear_!"

Zamasu raised both brows. Honestly he had never been regarded with so much fear before, and five-ish months ago he would've _basked_ in that fear. Now, he was just utterly confused. "I wasn't... going to kill you for saying anything negative. Don't hunch over like that." Ollie and Loki both went to Thomas' side and nudged him out of his crooked fetal position.

"Oh…" Thomas relaxed a bit, and shifted to sit normally. "Alright, uhh… okay." He looked up when he realized Zamasu was _chuckling_ at his reaction. "Look, you can't blame me for getting super scared. If some dude just appears in my house and then says their God and reads my mind, how else am I gonna react?"

The Kaioshin regarded the younger man with a smile, even though he can't relate to that."Fair enough, fair enough." Once Thomas had settled down, Loki got off of Thomas and went to sit by Zamasu. "Since Rebecca isn't here, tell me: how is she doing?"

After a pause, the teen twiddled his fingers at that question. "Well, she's okay." Zamasu didn't like that answer. "Just a little shaken up by umm…" A quick sigh, before he started to articulate. "Alright, so basically a little over two weeks ago there was a bomb sent to this house. She was away at the time."

Zamasu felt a strange sense of deja-vu; has he heard this before?

Thomas continued, articulating almost comically. "I shit you not, it was _right_ there." He threw his arms towards the floor. "I opened it the wrong way since there was button I had to press and it was a legit bomb in a box! So I had to call the cops, and tell Rebecca about it and ever since then she's been really anxious."

Unbeknownst to Thomas and Zamasu, the bomb incident wasn't what she's been anxious about.

"Really?" Zamasu frowned. "It was just in a box?"

"Well uhh," Thomas shifted uncomfortably, "It was for somebody."

"For Rebecca?"

"No." He shook his head. "It was for a friend of hers-I mean I don't think they're friends anymore- but they sent it for her coworker."

"What friend?" Zamasu accidentally connected the dots. "Terry?"

 _How the fuck does he know Terry?!_ "Y-yeah? How did you-"

"I know him as well." Zamasu briefed. "Why would they send a bomb to this house if it belongs to Terry?"

"While Rebecca was gone, I was watching over Ollie and Loki. And Terry oftentimes comes by to visit so that just meant whoever sent it… was watching over this house." The teen shivered at the thought. It was fucking _insane_ , he remembered how heavy the goosebumps on his body were.

"Does he know about this?"

"Yeah, I told him like… after he got off work." Thomas nodded. "He didn't seem too scared by it though. He was just like 'Oh god did you get it away from you? Did you call the cops?' and all that, and I had to tell him again, that there was a _bomb_ legit for _him_!"

 _Typical Terry_ , Zamasu could smile to himself, _putting everyone's safety before his_. Rightfully so too, the man was heavy in the medical field. "As long as you, and the dogs are safe." He was about to say _my dogs_ , but he stopped himself. Backtracking to what Thomas previously said, he asked. "They aren't friends anymore?"

"Yeah umm…" Thomas scratched the back of his head. "I dunno if you know this but… my sister has a habit of randomly cutting people out of her life. She was hurt a long time ago." He'll put it in layman's terms, he remembered that day in court despite being only five, and also not knowing what was really going on until he grew up. "I can't say it's caused by _that_ , but… she has a hard time trusting other people, particularly guys."

Zamasu felt his gut sink again, knowing what Thomas was hinting at. _Ugh_ , some people need to be burned. "I figured, but Terry was someone who genuinely cared about her well being. He helped her out of troublesome times."

He didn't want to drag Thomas into the black van thing that used to happen with her, he was way too young to be worried. But Thomas said something that threw all of that concern out of the window. "Terry already told me that she used to be seeked out by a group of people. And when he started helping her, they came after him until he couldn't help her anymore. They work in the same place, and that's probably the _only_ spot Terry can speak with her safely in private, but even in that she never wants to talk to him. Like, she goes out of her way to completely avoid him."

 _That_ was a strong word; if she 'ignored' him it wouldn't be as harsh as outright avoiding him. How could she see anything wrong with him? "Was this during the time she was being sought after?"

"Nope, after. Once she was fine and everything kept raining down on him, she just chose to stay away from him."

That sounds absolutely selfish, and he had no choice but to frown. Despite her trauma, he couldn't imagine Rebecca having such a hard time distinguishing between who she could befriend and who she can't. If that were the case, she and Irene should not be friends! "That's weird…"

"To me it is. Terry right now is kinda unbothered by it though. He's been cool ever since." Thomas' voice trailed off, he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket so he pulled it out to see his older sister's message.

 **Sis: Just checking up on you, kid. How are you doing over there?**

He rolled his eyes, she always ebbs on his age. **Everything's fine and shit.** An also instant reply came his way.

 **Sis: Good. Anyone important hit you up recently?**

He blinked; Zamasu came into this home like ten minutes ago. Did Rebecca know he was coming or something? It's not of her to ask if anyone had visited, despite how increasingly paranoid she started to become. Not to mention that message was sent so quickly. **Well no, not anyone important.**

Is Zamasu's arrival important? He essentially just wanted to know how Rebecca was doing, there wasn't anything majorly important on his end. He put his phone away and looked at Zamasu. "So yeah."

"You get really absorbed into your phone."

"Listen," Thomas threw a hand up in defense, "I'm young, I have more than enough time to do so." That was a really intelligent reply, and Zamasu was surprised to hear that come out of his mouth, especially because he's fifteen. Teenagers were in the middle of becoming responsible, and losing their privilege to not be, so what's the best thing most teenagers do? They pass the time by doing stupid shit up until responsibilities actually hit them. It's not shade.

Thomas felt another vibration in his pocket, so he pulled his phone out to see what his sister had sent him.

 **Sis: I'm actually on my way home now. I'll see ya in a bit.**

 **Sis: Make sure you don't tell anyone my business, k Toms? Love ya 3**

He started looking from his left to his right; this _can't be_ a coincidence because he was technically airing out that she was indeed avoiding Terry. That was something she didn't tell anyone, so getting this message right now was even more eerie for that fact.

"Are you okay?"

Thomas looked up at him and wiped off the creeped out look on his face. "Nah I'm, I'm good I just... looked at something weird."

"Like a text message?"

"Can you _read_ phones too?" Thomas narrowed his eyes.

"I can read your mind." Zamasu countered. "What business does she have?"

 _How ironic_ , that Zamasu would use such a strong word for someone so 'innocuous'. "I dunno, maybe it was like…" Thomas shrugged. "What I just said to you but she doesn't know about our conversation so… maybe it's just a coincidence or something."

"Your expression says otherwise." Zamasu chuckled. "Maybe it is. I don't think it's that much of a big deal, to inform someone on behalf of another."

"Yeaahh." He looked to the two dogs who were now playing amongst each other. "She said she's coming home soon, you wanna wait for her?"

Zamasu looked to the dogs as well. He had to choose between staying here with his two innocent pets, or going back to a home that belonged to a young, aggressive woman in heavy denial.

He looked back at Thomas and nodded. "Sure."

 **\/\/\/\/\/\/\/**

"Rebecca." She could hear Irene's voice growing stern and cold the more this conversation progressed. " _Rebecca_ , this isn't funny."

"Do you hear me laughing?" While she was heading home, Rebecca had decided to call Irene to chat more with her. Somewhere in the middle of the conversation, Rebecca had found out that Irene currently wasn't in her house; rather she was in James' house to hang out with him. James had given her a separate key to his home early on in their relationship, so Rebecca assumed that she was alone and preferred to keep her voice down in other people's houses. It was around this particular spill of info where she brought up a risky topic: her friend's relationship.

"No, but you ought to be." Irene sounded more and more irritated. "Why are you so worried about it anyway?"

Her possessive attitude would make someone who cared for her wellbeing check her, and tell her to tone down her sensitivity to actually _listen._ Zamasu did this beforehand, apparently that just meant he inadvertently was showing more regard than her own best friend, and he _hates_ her.

Rebecca shook her head. "Because it's irritating to hear everyday!" She expected the silence afterwards, and could imagine the hurt look on Irene's face. "Anytime I talk to you, there is not one convo we have where you _don't_ mention James. We've went over the whole kiss-bullshit already hun, he's not trying to hurt you at all! You don't need to be up his ass!"

Because it's thwarting her chances of bringing him down to a withering shell of success, and not because it genuinely hurts him and his ability to live as a human being.

Irene on the other hand, was having a hard time keeping her voice down. She mulled over the outburst Rebecca just had and frowned deeply at her concern over her boyfriend which… _made no sense_. "How are you gonna tell me all of this, when not even three weeks ago you were encouraging me to do what I am doing now? You were all on my side when I found that picture, and now you wanna switch on me?" She started to sit up confrontationally, she was leaning against James' living room couch. "Why, huh? Why? Why are you suddenly trying to pull me away from him?"

The doctor almost put her foot on the brake a bit too hard at that last question. She looked around as though people could hear through her closed, tinted windows, and steadied her nerves. "Irene, listen; there is nothing evil behind what I am _saying_ , girl! I'm looking out for your best interests."

"You're not _looking_ out for my best interests!" When Irene's whisper-like voice raised, Rebecca went still. Not because of her friend's voice, it's because she thought, for a moment, that Irene was keen enough to catch on to her manipulation. "You think that I'm being possessive and need to leave him alone. A relationship requires communication between two people; we can't be close if we don't know what we're doing."

Rebecca exhaled lightly in relief. "Sure but Irene, you're going nuts over every move he makes. That's what I meant! No one should be doing that to you in a relationship." The doctor _backpedaled_ her earlier statement in order to both keep her trust, and to get Irene to comply for now because _girl_ , when this woman is mad she's so hard to vouch for. "Clearly he's stressing you out!"

It was supposed to be the other way around, but _pandering_ is the best adage to trickery. "Rebecca… what business do you have over dictating what I can and can't do in a relationship?"

If Rebecca was actually consoling her, she would have been frustrated at how Irene wasn't _getting the point_. "This isn't healthy behavior! Your relationship isn't going to be any healthier if you keep pressing on him like this. You guys are taxing each other."

"Irene, you downstairs right?" James called from the upper floor of his house. He had a comfortable pair of pants on with a sweater slung over his shower, fresh out of a shower that ease his worked muscles. When he reached the bottom floor he looked up to see his girlfriend looking back at him with an almost forced smile. He already identified that look; it was as if she was trying to simmer down just to keep him from seeing how frustrated she was. "You alright, babe?"

"I'm fine, I'm just…" She pointed to her phone, not whispering anymore. "I am in a call with someone."

Rebecca on the other hand furrowed a brow. "Who's there, Irene?"

"It's _my boyfriend_ , Rebecca." Irene glared at her phone as if Rebecca was right in front of her.

"Oh…" She retracted back a bit, keeping the call on while Irene went back to talking with her boyfriend. She didn't say hi to him because well… it's customary for her not to.

"Are you two arguing or something?" James smirked a bit and went to sit next to Irene, slinging his arm around her shoulder to pull her closer. He expected her to snuggle into and bury her face against him, since she liked to do that when he was fresh out of a shower. Irene didn't do that; she was still frustrated by whatever was going on between her and Rebecca.

"It's nothing, baby. She's just... being difficult over a debate we're having." Irene smiled at him. Now that he can see her facial expressions, she looked heavily conflicted.

"It's not a debate, Irene." Rebecca retorted, just _loud_ enough for James to hear. Then she addressed him without saying his name. "I know you're over there. I don't want you getting involved, this is girl talk."

It was right after she said that when she realized she needed to _tone her annoyance_ down; she expected backlash but not _this_ much. Maybe it's because such was not towards her in the first place so she never cared to realize how impractical Irene actually was. She also did not think James would _directly_ talk to her, she thought he'd ignore her existence, but the assertive bass in his voice was toned up to a _scary_ extent.

"Hold it right there: I don't know what you're talking about to Irene but you're pissing her off." James sat up quickly, turning into that dominant, territorial boyfriend he always is; if you mess with the pack, you'll get your ass handed back to you and in this case, Irene is the one he's protecting.

 _Just goes to show how much he loves her._ What a _sad_ , sadthought. "It is none of your business!"

"It _better_ be my business if she's this upset." James grew stern, but still had a gentle hold over his strangely quiet girlfriend. "Irene, what is she telling you?"

She felt like she was being pulled in two polar directions. But since she was out to prove Rebecca wrong, she pulled the secrecy of their conversation right out of its hinge. "James, do you think I'm being too possessive?"

James paused. He didn't need to think about that answer, because recently it'd been a definite _yes_ , but why was Rebecca on the phone while she asked such a thing? And why were they talking about this? "Is that what this is all about?"

Rebecca felt her eye twitch, _for fucks sake_ this idiot didn't know how to hold arguments on her own. No wonder why she pampered herself in a safe little bubble all of her life. The doctor had already pulled up in front of her mansion, having passed her opened gate and was sitting in her parked car. "You know what, _yes_ it is." Instead of getting angry, Rebecca decided she'd twist this narrative around so that she can leave this conversation _unscathed_. "And don't play around like you wouldn't answer her, James; I _know_ you've been complaining about it to your friends. Adrian, Jay, _Lexi_ \- everyone knows that you can't stand having Irene call you _every single day_ to know where you are, who you're with, _all_ that shit. Stop dancing around this glaring problem in your relationship and address it instead of getting confrontational with me!"

That rewarded her with the silence she wanted to hear, from the both of them. On their end, Irene had the phone in her hand right by her lower thigh, and they both were looking at it since Rebecca was on speaker. Then, as if luck had graced the doctor, Irene slowly turned to James after he didn't rebuke immediately. "Is that true?"

 _Now_ here's James wondering why Irene was shifting towards her bestfriend's side _knowing_ that he was right here, right _next_ to her. "Irene, she's fro-"

"Is it true that you told everyone else that I was annoying to you?" Rebecca ignited the fire back into her bestfriend, and she was grateful for not being on the receiving end.

James sighed heavily. "I didn't tell them you were annoying. With the amount of work I've been doing, I can't keep answering every call you make to me. It'll just stall everything-"

"Then tell me that!"

"I _did_ tell you that!" James raised his free hand in reassurance, trying to keep his girl from getting any more riled up. "I told you, more than _twice_ , that I can't keep up with your calls! I know you're still shaky on what happened back at Tatch, I _know_ that and I'm not letting anyone get between the both of us! Speaking of which," He batted an eye to Irene's phone, "Turn that off, now; this isn't Rebecca's business."

This was the _perfect time_ to drop the most irrelevant bomb on her bestfriend, because she slept with James _way_ before the two started dating. But Irene didn't know that. "I'm not out to fuck you again, James. Let's get _that_ clear."

Irene's eyes went super fucking wide, like they were going to fall right out of their sockets. James at first did not understand why she looked like that because… he assumed that Rebecca probably told her that before they had started dating. But now he realized Rebecca kept that a secret, and was making it out as if they had sex _during_ his relationship. " _Again_?!"

He jumped at the loudness of her voice because she was so close to him. "Irene, that happened _before-"_

"Before _nothing_! So now you're fucking my bestfriend, asshole?!" Irene slapped his arm away from her shoulder. "Don't fucking touch me."

 _Meanwhile, meantime in between-time,_ Rebecca could feel her scheme working right before her eyes. Or ears, rather, you can't see people through a voice call. She didn't care what happened between the both of them, she just wanted to hear those two _toasty_ words out of her mouth.

"Irene, that didn't happen while we were dating!" James raised both hands.

"Bullshit." She shook her head. "You're ly-"

"No I'm not, _listen_ to _me_!" James held her shoulders. "Way before we were a thing, me and Rebecca… _yes_ we did have affairs here and there but I didn't know you at the time-"

"Yes you did." Rebecca lied. "Irene was my best friend, you knew that! You knew more about me other than what's between my legs!" She shouted, now playing the 'victim'. "From the get-go, you've betrayed her, don't get it twisted, Irene-"

"Why are _you_ saying anything when you went ahead and fucked him?!" Irene yelled at her phone, not letting James rectify the entire situation. "You know what, fuck you. Fuck the both of you; James, we're fucking through." She leaned forward with emphasis when she saw that he was trying to speak. " _Through_! And Rebecca, snakey _bitch, lose my fucking number!_ "

Rebecca wasn't even hurt. Her smile progressively got bigger because she finally did what she needed to do. Even though Irene had hung up, and presumably smacked James upside the head before leaving since she was stupid enough to take the bait from her bestfriend, and even though she had lost a friendship that's been built up for years over something that wasn't even in the right circumstance or true, she didn't care; James was left alone, and that's what she wanted. Irene no longer trusted him, and that was the first step to his downfall.

She hopped right out of her car and shut the door while casually texting her brother to tell him that she was here. She went to her door, still smiling to herself, and when she opened it the first thing, or person she saw, was not Thomas. It was Zamasu, sitting on the couch rubbing Ollie and Loki's ears.

The smallest part of her heart felt shameful for a reason she didn't understand, kind of like a daughter that's been covert behind her father's back, but she didn't care about that. She still kept the smile on her face.

"Zamasu!" She went up to him and _hugged_ the God while he was sitting, accidentally covering his face with her chest. She smelled of snapdragons.

"Hi…" He muffled under her tight ass hug, she was swaying him left and right before she let go of him, both of her hands still on his shoulders. He hadn't raised his hands off of where they once were, now that her dogs surrounded the doctor. He looked up at Rebecca's tired, but happy face. She finally stood straight up and skipped to her kitchen while both Ollie and Loki followed her. The Kaioshin watched the obedient canines walk with their rightful owner, staying by her side until they disappeared. He himself, however, felt no reason to move...

Zamasu felt a _whole_ new energy out of this woman. Sure, she looked very pleased, but there was something… not right about that bright expression on her face. He narrowed his eyes, he crossed his arms, he tilted his head in scrutiny; her excitement was _wicked_.

"Rebecca." He started to approach the kitchen, but he didn't step in. He stood against the wall, just before its entrance, as if he didn't want to go near her. "How are you feeling?"

He didn't mean to have any conviction behind that question but subconsciously, something was completely off the hinges with this young woman, and it was bothering him. She on the other hand, answered simply. "I'm just happy to be here, finally. Seeing Ollie biting your pants brought back adorable memories."

Yup, Ollie _is_ biting the young God's pants right now. He knew that. "Hmm…" He slowly nodded. "Anything special happened today?"

She raised a brow. "Special?"

"Like, during work or after, even?" He specified.

Rebecca's smile remained on her face as she chose to keep her own scrutiny of him quiet. He was asking very innocent questions but his eyes were searching. She did not like people _searching_ her. "Well no, not really. I just saw you and got really happy. I dunno, I'm just… bouncy today."

She giggled, and leaned backwards a bit with a bit of a wiggle. This was a form of 'pretty posing'; her body language purposely exuded purity, innocence, _jolliness_ … she did this same behavior around Ambrose, she remembered, because she felt threatened by him and his integrity. She was using the same facade on Zamasu, knowing that he could read her mind and discern the crooks in her gestures instantly, but the difference is that she didn't despise the God. " _Toms!_ "

" _Wat?_ " Thomas yelled from upstairs, his voice was very distant since the living room was huge and the stairs were far from the kitchen.

Rebecca then looked at Zamasu. "Did he introduce himself to you? Or did he just like," She gestured almost wobbly, _pretty posing._ "Lock himself upstairs like a _mite_?" She said the last word louder, seeing her brother walk down the stairs.

Zamasu turned around, and Thomas was now wearing a white shirt that said ONYX. The Kaioshin now knew what kind of music the kid was into. Thomas frowned. "Are you talking about me again?"

"Not at all." Rebecca _nodded_ while saying that, making her brother roll his eyes. Zamasu really did admire the fact that Thomas could read sarcastic body language quite well. "Did you meet Zamasu?"

"Yeah, he like… teleported into the house or something and we talked a bit." Thomas shrugged, and he found himself frowning at how much his older sibling was smiling. She seemed so jumpy compared to how she woke up this morning, in which she was more dragged-through and paranoid, like normal. "Did something good happen at work?"

Zamasu raised his brows. He wondered if her own brother could sense something wrong in her antics. "Well nah, I'm just in a skippy mood." She went to the fridge and grabbed a bottle of sparkling fruit juice. She opened the freezer and pulled out a pie of pizza. "Y'guys want pizza tonight?"

Zamasu has had pizza a long time ago… not really. _Gosh_ why is time passing by so slowly? "Sure…"

"Good, I'll pop it in the oven." She nodded, opened its packaging to reveal a frozen, Sicilian-like cheese pizza, and went to her oven to turn it on. She did this whole process silently, while the two males watched her move, almost skipping around in her actions. When she was done, she turned to them. "We'll wait for that, I'll take a shower and relax a bit and by that time, it'll be done!"

She walked past the two of them and went upstairs, both males were mostly silent until they no longer heard her feet running up the steps. Zamasu was suspicious now, she must have done something that made her really happy and he had no problem with that- but the way she kept parading around with a giant smile on her face… he felt like she did something bad and didn't want him to know or see. Even with the way she was preparing their pizza; she pranced around while the two men were watching her as if she was all alone.

"She's being really weird today..."

Zamasu looked to Thomas. "Today?"

"This morning, she woke up as if someone dragged her out of her bed." Thomas shook his head. "Now she's all smiley and stuff but I dunno. It just looks forced to me."

"You wouldn't be wrong." The Kaioshin agreed with the young man. Why would she need to do that? It wasn't like she was on her woman cycle. Zamasu had memorized her, Irene's, and Lexi's menstrual clocks, and now should not be the time or else it'd be really late.

"I hope nothing bad happened to her."

"What makes you say that?"

Thomas looked down at the ground. "I remember the days after the party where… she looked super happy, but there was something really wrong with her." Now he was showing nervous tics; he rubbed his left elbow, being uncomfortable with sharing this information but he figured Zamasu would understand. "She would always laugh and smile with everyone but in the meantime, she would refuse to eat a lot. She also couldn't sleep sometimes, and pulled all-nighters, and there were a few times where she'd keep herself in the shower for hours."

That one photo he saw way back when he accidentally became nosy made a _whole_ lot of sense, the one where she looked extremely skinny and her face was pale. Of course, she's very pale-skinned naturally but the way her vibe held up in that picture; Rebecca looked _dead_. Maybe this could be a sign that something must have happened to her recently, and she's just forcing herself to deal with it unhealthily.

Man, they are both heavily _uninformed_. _Ooh, chile_...

"I'd venture to guess it's not that." Zamasu waved his hand. "She'll calm down and become neutral again within a few hours."

And she did actually. Rebecca came downstairs, served the pizza but didn't eat with them, all the while smiling and chatting with them normally. Zamasu did not take note of the fact that he and Thomas were sitting in the living room while Rebecca was getting the pizza out for the both of them. When she entered the living room, she had two plates in hand; one with three slices, and one with five. We all know who got the big ass serving.

Around _exactly 30 minutes_ , the three had stopped talking. It was 9:54 at night, and Thomas' yawning kept getting progressively frequent.

"Thomas." Rebecca tilted her head towards to him. "Go to sleep."

"I'm good, Idunnowhutyu-" He stopped to yawn again. This whole time, he was having trouble keeping his eyes open.

"What did you even do?" Zamasu asked Thomas. Rebecca almost thought he was talking to her at first.

"I like… did a lot of stuff." Thomas took a deep breath. "I walked the dooooogs, I cleaned the houuuuse…"

"You don't _clean_ , Thomas." Rebecca straight faced before getting up to grab him by his ear. " _Go to bed."_

"It's mad early-ow, ow, ow, _ow!_ Stop that!" Thomas had to stand up. "Don't pinch my-" ...and he interrupted his yawn. "Ear!"

"Go sleep. Goodnight." Rebecca crossed her arms as Zamasu laughed at the siblingship. This was cute to watch.  
"Fiiiine. Goodnight 'Bec. G'nite, Zamasu…" Thomas started slurring again. The kid trudged his way down the living room and up the stairs, leaving the two adults alone.

Zamasu did not peep the fact that Thomas started getting tired directly after eating because it was a long timespan to even be considered abnormal, and Thomas was already a very chilled down person in general. He did not know that Rebecca had slipped the _smallest bit_ of a safe narcotic into his food that acted like Z-Quil, but much stronger. As for Zamasu, the woman wanted him to stay, even though he should be gone, so she 'slipped' the entire tasteless, odorless bottle into the Kaioshins, and dressed it up with some herbs. It wouldn't do anything to him, but she's fond of countermeasure.

"Your brother is very smart for his age." Zamasu remarked, watching the teen as he traveled up the stairs.

"He is." She smiled. "He's one of the top kids in his class, even though he doesn't do anything other than play video games." Thomas was good at _sliding by_ when it came to school. Besides the majority of his classes were all around programming and game development; he was _comfy_ in the institution. "How have you been? How are things with you and Irene?"

Y'all ever see someone talking to somebody and just feel your skin crawl? Like you _know_ they're doing some underhanded shit, and the oblivious person has no idea how horrible of a person they are dealing with?

"She's… annoying as usual." Zamasu said, he was suddenly toned down on insulting the afro-haired woman. "Things aren't going well for her."

"How so?"

"She's in heavy denial. I'm sure you can understand." Zamasu's eyes cut into Rebecca abruptly, it make her sit a bit straighter. He was saying that because she was all on Irene's side when that whole ordeal happened, he wanted to make it apparent to the doctor that her friend's mindset has gone a bit too far.

Well… _former_ friend. "Why look at me like that?"

"Because you were with her actions."

"Well not _now_!" Rebecca shook her head. "I've spoken with her already but… she just wouldn't understand me." She looked downwards sullenly. "We got into a really big argument, and she thought I was trying to… I dunno, _manipulate_ the way her and James' relationship should be." She clasped her hands against her thighs when she saw Zamasu's deep frown. "I don't even know either."

The first step to desensitizing someone, is to make the accused action seem too crazy to even fathom.

"But why you?" He raised a brow. "All you did was give her advice and _that_ is what she assumed?"

"Apparently so." She nodded, and then shrugged. "It was so bad it… she called off on our friendship."

Zamasu's eyes went wide. "Over _James_?" Sure, he may think that Irene was an idiot, and that anyone who hung out with her had to have at least a few migraines, but from what he knew, Irene was Rebecca's only long standing friend. Lexi could not outbeat the amount of years these two had together, and now to see that Rebecca basically had _no one_ outside of her younger brother, her dogs, and even him to some degree… it made him worry about her potential mentality. This woman was somebody who always longed for close human company and Irene was all she got; now she's lost that.

Rebecca fiddled with her fingers, not only because she was faking this whole _victim_ behavior, but because the gravity of this situation was starting to weigh in on the more sensible side of her now that she fake explained it to the God. Who was she going to turn to whenever she had a bad day or… at least to say something of womanly importance or to get something off her chest? Irene was the only female friend she had that she could freely call and text, Lexi is too busy working with the man she despised. But now Irene was gone, out of her own willful ignorance, and the doctor had no one. _Nobody._

She shook her head. "Don't worry about it, Zamasu." She voiced what she was saying in her head, at least to make it sound like she was more concerned with what the Kaioshin thought.

"I'm not worrying at all…" Zamasu shook his head. "How about James?"

"She was at his house and they got into an argument while I was on the phone. I heard something about her breaking up with him, and then I was cut off."

 _Now_ Zamasu felt a bit of relief on James' part because this guy has been through hell. Irene could _not_ spend one day without bothering him because she didn't trust him, and now she's let go of him. He can finally live in damned _peace_. " _Good."_

Rebecca started to laugh. "Really now? That's not nice."

"It's nice for him." Zamasu said quickly. "She needs to learn that not everything can go in her way."

"That's been a big problem of hers, ya know. Ever since highschool but… she wasn't a popular girl or anything so she never got criticized for it." Rebecca looked downwards; that was what people said about _her._ She came to know Irene and found out that the artist was way worse than her, and for _her_ to get called out for even the littlest of inconvenience? It was unfair, and she hated that so much; seeing shamed reflections of her own persona shamelessly appear on other people.

"But you were." He bridged. "And you got criticized for it, didn't you?"

"I mean, I was not… a great person back then. I was horrible." Rebecca giggled a bit. And she was right; back then, she was horrible…

Now, she's a fucking serpent.

"Hmm…" He thought. "Things will even out. I still have to return to Irene's home to read my books." That earned a snort for the woman. "Excuse you?"

"You're so nerdy."

"I'm intelligent."

"So am I. I pre-plan everything." She smiled and stood up. "That book can probably wait. Why not chill out here? It's obviously you don't wanna go back and _trust me_ , you _don't._ "

She's right, and besides his room in her house is quite swell-looking, with that nice infinity table… "Ah, fine. I'll stay here for the night."

"Yay!" She got really happy, she almost hopped in excitement. She trotted and plopped down in front of her TV and slapped the seat to her. "Let's watch a movie!"

Zamasu chuckled, but he felt like this was her way of immediately trying to deal with losing her best friend to a petty situation. Perhaps she suggested him staying out of his personal benefit, since Irene is probably a firecracker right now just venting in her house, but she also wanted him around because he gave her _company_. He was another person she could talk to without feeling horrible.

She shook her head when she heard Duble's words in her head; _don't think that this business we have will leave you without any scars…_ it's not like she cared about her friendship. All she had to do was find another body to talk to and for now, Zamasu was supplanting that. But she can't have him around for too long because he'll catch her drift, and like he said: he's _intelligent_.

There was no doubt about that. They may be close right now, but she'll later work on keeping him _far away_ from her.

 **8-8-8-8-8-8-8-8**

The shoot was _finally_ done, now the young model had stretched in her silken robe. She had met a multitude of models who were supplanted with her in order to represent the new issue, both male and female alike, and now Lexi was drinking a glass of Shuri Temple while looking at the set that was now being taken apart. The photographers have bid their parting and left with extremely happy faces, probably because of the money that they just earned, and she now had the chance to relax. The model didn't need to look over to the far right to see Ambrose sitting down, talking to one of the catalogue people and repeatedly looking at her. She pretended her heart wasn't drop kicking her rib cage at the moment.

During the photoshoot, Ambrose would observing her with complimenting eyes the entire time and even though she was doing her best to act like he wasn't actually there, she can _feel_ them. Once the catalogue person left, Lexi approached him, her face bare after the hours they spend shooting.

"You have a very confident poise."

It did not stop the stupid pink flush on her cheeks from coming. "Thanks." She looked down for a moment only to look up and see that he had that brewing smile again. "What?"

He chuckled lightly. "It's funny, because you have a very strong air about you, yet you can't look me in the eye."

" _Yes I can!_ " And with that, Lexi straight faced at him for _two seconds_ before she started to falter… because he's hot.

He gestured. "See?"

" _Shhh_." Lexi placed a finger over her mouth, making him chuckle. "What's next after this?"

He shrugged. "We go home."

"Oh…" The model blinked. "Really?"

"Mm-hmm." He nodded and stood up. "Unless you'd like to eat first before we leave."

"That sounds like a good plan to me." Lexi nodded. "You're probably really really hungry too, Ambrose."

There were a couple of breaks she had here and there where she could eat, and was given filling, but super healthy food from time to time. In all the hours they spent shooting, she seriously hadn't seen this man _eat_ or drink anything, not even once. Lexi found it weird that Ambrose, despite his slender and taut build, seemed to not eat a lot; even in Intima, when he would go places with her or on the two occasions of buffets he had with her friends, the engineer barely ate or drank anything. Instinctively, she got worried.

Unknown to her though, Ambrose doesn't eat much outside of his own home, but he becomes the biggest fatass when it comes to _fruits_.

"I'm fine." Ambrose shook his hand. He stood up and regarded her concerned look with a warm smile. "Don't worry about me."

She started walking with him. "You haven't eaten since we left Tycho, even before that."

He was a little bit of ahead of her going over to a lounge setting-like room when he sighed and slowed his pacing to a stop to turn to her. "I don't eat while I am working." He said. "It makes me tired."

"How?" Lexi furrowed her brow. "Wouldn't you get tired from not having anything in your system?"

"Not really." He shook his head. "I'd safe all of that afterwards." He can comfortably go long periods of time without eating anything. It's a learned behavior…

"But…" Now the model, still showing concern, supplanted. "We've finished, haven't we? Why don't we eat together instead of you watching me eat?"

" _Lexi,_ " He had to reassure her again, "I'm _not_ hungry, at least not right now. Relax, I'm not starving myself either."

She finally deflated. "Fine, fine, I just… thought you'd like a treat at least. But okay."

He nodded, affirming his position on the topic, and then went to sit down on the sofas. Lexi also sat, instantly relinquishing in the softness of the seat's material. She's never been to a place so magnificent before, to even land a position here would guarantee a _dreamsworthy_ salary and she knew she was going to get a _lot_ of bread after this issue's full release.

Avery came a little bit after both Andrew and Frank did. The two giant tower men waved and smiled at Lexi in the most unexpectedly modest way, since they both seem super imposing the gesture looked really shy. Avery, with his _haute couture_ gait, greeted her with the classic Efilian palm-up wave. She smiled and waved back while Ambrose looked at his bodyguards.

Frank, the bald one, clasped his fists together. "We good to go?"

"Yup." Ambrose nodded and stood up, motioning for Lexi to follow him as he addressed Avery. "Chandler has anything important for me?"

"Actually, no." Avery spoke, his amazing accent catching Lexi's ears. "He told me a few shuttles have returned earlier today. They've retrieved a great number of resources from several nearby asteroids."

Here is what the fourth division of Rose Corp's sector specializes in: _asteroid mining_. This is the very first corporation to conceive ships and shuttles, as well as satellites and bots, to mine and monitor asteroids and nearby uninhabited planets in the solar system. That is the main reason as to why Rose Corp is so prosperous, and why Ambrose is now a multi-trillionaire.

Ambrose nodded. "Good. Do you know how many?"

"He never specified the amount, but I'm assuming that they are still running checks on them." Avery shrugged.

She left it at that, allowing the two men to speak to one another about stuff that she didn't understand. Bidding the photographers and the catalogue notists a kind farewell, Lexi and the men stepped outside and into the night sky of Locette, awaiting by a classified limousine with an embassy plate.

Alright listen, y'all know if you see an _embassy plate limo_ rolling around, that means they are either government officials or a president/representative sitting within that car. Even though they did ride in one coming here today, Lexi still felt herself shake a bit knowing how _big_ the silly, smart man in front of her was. She tapped Andrew against his beefy arm and whispered to him. "Do you ever get overwhelmed by this?"

"By what? This?" Andrew nodded over to the car. Lexi actually didn't expect him to speak, but he was lenient. "It's become a staple thing now." He said confidently before keeping it real. "...But it's still kinda jarring."

The model giggled before entering the limo, sitting between the two bodyguards on one side while Avery and Ambrose sat across from them. Speaking in Locette's official language, Ambrose told the chauffeur to head to a nearby eatery to get his employees and Lexi something to eat. Lexi pretended that she wasn't flushing mad over how sexy he sounded speaking another language.

They reached the place in no time, and the _only two people_ who ordered the absolute most food were the bodyguards themselves. Of course, Ambrose told the four of them that they could have whatever they want, and Frank had to make his own acclaim very clear.

"You said we could have _anything?_ " He asked, hands folded politely with a quiet voice once they sat in a spacey booth.

Ambrose looked at Frank, giving him a knowing smile. Lexi realized that the bond Ambrose has with his bodyguards was more personal instead of just being all about business. In fact the same thing goes for _everyone_ he's close with at Rose Corp. "You can have anything, we've been through this before. I know you're hungry."

"I'm just making sure, you know. I don't wanna… compromise anything." Frank dialed back again. Both Andrew and Avery rolled their eyes with chuckles.

Now the trillionaire laughed. "You can order _anything_ you want."

"Anything?"

" _Anything._ "

And then he and Andrew nearly ordered the entire restaurant.

While Andrew and Frank engorged themselves with _etiquette_ of course, these guys aren't Goku or Vegeta, Avery went for a smaller, gourmet style meal after recommending something of the same stature to Lexi. Ambrose settled for a cup of chamomile tea so that Lexi would stop giving him grandmotherly looks.

Khai would love this guy. Chamomile is the chillest of tea herbs.

"Do you know what you're going to wear to that party?" Avery looked to his boss with a smirk. "Full suit or…?"

"Oh _no_ , not a full suit." Ambrose shook his head. "Maybe an, I dunno, a simple dress shirt."

It's really cute to hear him say _simple_ , but watch that one dress shirt cost thousands.

Ambrose took a sip of his tea. "What are you gonna be we-oh wait, you told me already."

"Yeah, the braided blazer." The fashion admin nodded.

"You really like to live dangerously."

"What party?" Lexi looked between the two, accidentally being nosy. Avery gave Ambrose a glance before the trillionaire decided to explain.

"It's a special party." He shrugged.

"Is it that party that all the super rich people go to?" She furrowed her brow, and then pointed at Ambrose. "You're going to that?"

He nodded, and Avery chimed in. "Much to everyone's shock."

"I've been to those kind of parties before." The engineer justified, pursing his lips to prove his point.

It was a weak point, though. Avery's lips curved. "Only once."

Ambrose casted a gaze down at the carpet floor with a sheepish look.

"Rebecca is going there too." Lexi said after laughing along with the men. "And Irene, and I think James too."

Arched brows raised. "Really?"

"Mm-hmm." She nodded. "They all miss you."

"Oh come on now, it's only been a little over two weeks."

His modesty was so cute. "That's a _long time_!"

Andrew made a really low near-inaudible noise, which they all realized was just a failed attempt at suppressing a burp. He raised a hand apologetically. "My bad."

"Nice one." Frank looked at him, earning a playful nudge from his fellow bodyguard.

"Are Frank and Andrew going too?" Lexi asked, making the two bodyguards look at her.

"Nope." Ambrose looked at them. "They'd rather stay home and watch a UMAC fight."

"Listen, Ambrose," Frank put his chicken wing down in a comically negotiating manner, "that stuff is _serious_. Right Andrew?"

"It is." Andrew nodded. "Everybody's betting money on Khazi for the men's and J for women."

"Khazi is not gonna win." Avery shook his head.

This is the part where Frank gets animated, because combat is his _city._ "He's so gonna win, get outta here!"

"I didn't know Jean was in the finals." Lexi said, shocked. She knew June's twin was in the UMAC but thought it to be contemporary. Apparently, she actually wants to win it too.

And there is no doubt she will. If she can make Zamasu's heart rate raise at least three beats then she's a force to be reckoned with.

"Mm-hmm, she's pretty strong." Ambrose said, not really referring to her physical strength since he's met the woman before, she has a large ki signature... Then he turned his attention to Frank, who was already debating with Avery at the moment.

The Efilian admin shook his head. "Khazi is going up against Vlad. He's going to get bodied."

"Khazi literally went the entirely of the championships without losing a beat. He'll win, _watch_." Frank crossed his arms.

"You guys are delusional." Andrew shook his head, speaking with suspense. "It is very obvious, that of the four biggest names right now… the only two coming out with the W is J and Khazi."

" _Noooo,_ it'll be J and Vlad." Avery shook his head. Lexi and Ambrose started to giggle at how the men were getting riled up.

"I put money down on Khazi right now." Frank placed his hand on the table.

Avery shrugged. "Alright, bet."

Frank still sat confidentiality. "Bet that he's gonna win."

"Bet that _Vlad_ is gonna snap him." Avery leaned forward.

" _Sure_." Frank reclined, now hype. "On 400, Khazi is winning."

He was referring to them betting on 400 Zent. Avery shook his head. "You're cheap."

"I'm not about to give you more than 400." Frank said, making Avery snort. "Because Khazi has been strong all season."

Avery damn near flailed. "Oh my god, it does not matter about what he did in the best 16, or the quarters or the halves! It's _Vlad_ he's up against, he's gonna bloody lose."

At this point, the three men were now in a full _heated_ discussion about the UMAC fight. Ambrose shook his head and quietly sipped his tea, casting a look at Lexi. "It's even worse in the building. A lot of my employees are into this stuff."

"My goodness." Lexi shook her head. "This is going to be a crazy week. I can feel it…"

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **Snapdragons are flowers. They represent deceit, and at the same time, gracefulness.**

 **And speaking of deceit, Rebecca done** _ **ended**_ **two relationships at once; hers with Irene, and Irene's with James. If you didn't think she was a homewrecker, you can** _ **think**_ **again.**

 **Ya'll see how she switched the game up, knowing that Zamasu already cared more about her than he does with Irene? She told him that their friendship was over, and with Zamasu knowing how isolated she was, it'd help with her indulgent need to keep him around for the sake of company. Intelligence is quite the gift, isn't it?**


	45. Leeway from Truth

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 **Leeway from Truth**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

That night, Lexi had just realized the busy schedule she'll be having. Aside from her photoshoot being done, and the incoming interviews, Irene had texted her on behalf of what she should wear for the _rich people party_. She remembered the agitated, hoarse sound of the artist's voice and how she wanted to calm herself a bit down, at least so that Lexi wouldn't be bombarded with her situation.

"You need help on picking out a dress?"

"Mm-hmm."

Lexi can almost see the feverish nod Irene had just done. Sitting on the luxurious couch of her partner's private jet, Lexi ran her fingers through her hair; it was a nervous tic she had. "Are you… okay over here?" The model's concern was noted; Irene had taken a deep sigh to actively steady her nerves.

"...I'm… I'm fine, something happened and I'd rather wait until we're together for you to hear it out."

"Why not tell me now?" It was unlike Irene to not air out what she wanted over the phone, when she wanted to vent she'll _vent_ wherever she can. "Is it that bad?"

"It's more… it's fucked up, honestly." Irene shook her head. "I'd rather speak face-to-face about it. Where are you right now?"

"I'm flying back to Tycho." Lexi added the next statement with a growing smile on her face, looking at the cozy, lazy-bunned trillionaire across from her reading a book. "With Ambrose."

Apparently he was so immersed in the pages in front of him, he didn't realize Lexi was on the phone. So when she said his name, he looked at her with slightly wide eyes. "Hmm?"

She giggled at his cuteness. "I'm on the phone with Irene."

He mouthed ' _Oh_ ', and then leaned forward looking at her phone, to which Lexi put on speaker. "Hi there."

"Hi, Ambrose!" Irene was really ecstatic to hear his voice. "Aww- wait he's actually with you? Then who's… controlling the plane?"

"This particular jet isn't mine, Irene."

" _Oh._ " She shouldn't be surprised at how nonchalant his response was. "Is Lexi spending the night with you?"

The model's cheeks flushed pink at that question, even though Ambrose answered it in the most innocent way possible. "She opted to, because she was tired and is lazy and didn't want to wait for a ride home."

"I'm not _lazy,_ I'm just _tired_." Lexi shot a look at the calm ass rich man.

"You don't even have to _drive_ , Lexi."

"But waiting makes me _tired_." She waved her hands. "Don't argue with me."

Ambrose had no problem with her staying at his home. The thing is, he lives in Insula, the entire forest was gigantic, excluding the 7 square mile land he owns. If she wanted to get a ride, the only person she'd viably ask for one is Ambrose himself. Aside from that, Lexi kind of wanted to see the house that he lived in, since according to Zamasu it wasn't some super duper huge, town-wide mansion that he definitely could afford a thousand times over. _That's_ riveting.

Lexi took her phone off speaker, after rolling her eyes at Ambrose's shrug. "I'm gonna meet with you tomorrow afternoon, we'll discuss what you can buy together. I thought you'd go with Rebec-"

"I don't want to."

 _Well damn,_ Lexi blinked. "Uhh… alright then. Do you have any idea of a brand you wanna wear?"

There was a pause. And then Irene said with so much clarity… " _Rosé_."

Ohhh, Lexi knew Rebecca hated _anything_ with Ambrose's name attached to it. Whatever happened, must've happened between those two and from how malice-like Irene's voice became, _it was not pretty_.

"Really? Rosé?" Lexi asked, and that again pulled Ambrose out of his entertaining book.

"What about it?"

"Stop being nosy." Lexi looked at him and then comically sassed her fingers in front of him. "It's nun'ya business."

He smiled. A really sweet smile. "It is. I own that brand."

The model sighed playfully. "Irene wants to wear a Rosé dress for that party."

"Really?" He raised his brows. "That's cool."

"Umm… that's all you have to say?"

"...Yeah?" Ambrose looked back up at her, confused. "I think shopping should be something between you two exclusively, if that's what you're hinting at."

It is what's she hinting at. She expected him to start giving Irene pointers but he too humble to do so. _Adorable_. "Fine, fine. Alright, Irene."

"Yeah?" She was giggling at their interaction.

"Goodnight, hun. I'll see you tomorrow afternoon- what are you laughing at?"

Irene couldn't help the smile on her face. "You two sound cute together."

" _Oh why thank you okay bye_." Lexi quickly said and then she ended the call after hearing Irene laugh again. She placed her phone on the armest and sighed, not trying to dwell on the question of spending the night with him _or_ the comment Irene just made.

"I heard that."

"UGH!" Lexi looked away from the handsome man brewing a smirk at her.

The flight afterwards wasn't long. Once they had landed, Avery, Frank and Andrew bid the two farewell while Ambrose told her he drove to the West City Airport in his own personal car. She had never seen his car before in person before; Lexi had seen videos of the sleek black trailblazing beauty from a channel but once she _actually_ beheld the car with her eyes, her knees felt weak.

First of all, his car was parked in a first class lot, reserved for the highest acclaimed individuals and a margin of billionaires. This one wasn't the aforementioned black car, but it was a custom model from the biggest car company in Desna, Numen. The vehicle had beautiful hover-exhausts and the entirety of it had a _chrome-_ plum finish, the windows being non-reflective. Approaching the car, Ambrose pressed a button on his car keys and the car's doors opened _upwards_ , revealing the velvet accented interior with pulsing, yellow underlights.

If she wasn't into cars, she was into them _right damn now._

The moment she sat in, her butt _sang_ at the plush cushion even after sitting on an expensive jet couch. _This was fucking magical_ , she thought, and she looked to the driver's seat to see Ambrose giving her a look.

"You enjoying yourself over there?"

"Maybeeeee…" Lexi sing-songed, and he chuckled, and then she stopped. She hated when he chuckled, because he sounds so… you get the point.

The car was turned on, and the yellow lights around the sat-nav, under the chairs and outlining the door rests became slightly brighter. He reversed out of the lot, almost too smoothly, and turned into the lot's exit all with one hand. She couldn't help staring at him, how he was leaned back against his seat with one hand on the wheel and the other gently rested against the shifts. There was something… _sexy_ about watching a man drive; girls, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Good lord, she needed to cool down...

"You're making me nervous."

Lexi frowned at him, even though _she_ was the one staring. They reached a red light when Ambrose finally said that. "Huh? How?"

He giggled. "You're just... staring at me." He sat up a bit straight. "I'm not an avid fan of people just gaping at me when I drive."

"Ambrose, I'm sure it happens a _lot_ with who you are."

"It does, but you're _right here_." He gestured comically making Lexi laugh. Silence between the two before Ambrose checked the time, and also the street he was in; he was close to reaching the megaway.

He suddenly slapped his own thigh and smiled. "I think I know a way to keep you from gawking." His hand started to grip the gear shift…

"And what way is tha-"

Lexi found herself _grasping_ the seatbelt that she was wearing when Ambrose suddenly sped up, at least to _80_ miles per hour in a matter of a couple seconds. With the grace of a speed drifter, they were real close to a turn which made Lexi _glue_ her eyes to the incoming road in fear. "A-AMBROSE, WHAT'RE YO-"

He drifted with so much _sauce_ through sharp turns, intersections and merge lanes without even hitting anything, despite _speeding_ to a point of potential danger. Since the streets were empty in the vicinity they were in, he could do that without worrying about hitting another car, but that was _not_ what was going through Lexi's head. Grabbing her seatbelt as though she were hanging from a radio tower, she barely had enough time to brace herself for the batshit crazy, and impressively talented driving that the trillionaire exhibited. Once Ambrose reached the spiral-like lane that led to the megaway, he switched gears again and put both hands on the wheel and turned quickly, ignoring Lexi's yelps of fear.

This man was _powersliding_ into a damn megaway.

He righted himself quickly as he entered the six-laned megaway, progressing his speed slowly until it looked like they were on a fucking light rail. Lexi had _never_ been on the megaway, but she's been told that this was the one place where there was literally no speed limit; the majority of drivers here had to have cars with extended horsepower, much like Ambrose's, which was now leveling over hundreds of miles per hour at the moment.

Ambrose looked around the near empty road. For now, it would be a straight road for another 400 miles and since his car was going at a smooth, tranquil _630 miles per hour_ , the megaway's end would be reached within 40 minutes. Hitting cruise control, Ambrose clasped his hands together, and stretched his neck nonchalantly as if he didn't just purposely put the poor model in 'danger'. "We're almost home."

Lexi was still holding on for dear life to her own seatbelt _and_ her seat. Her hair was all over the place, and she had her back arched all the way up in so much alarm. He looked at her to await her response (with that stupid damn smile because he _knew_ she ought to piss herself), and she spoke quietly with the posture of a tree. "...okay."

She may be all about _risque,_ but that was practically a roller coaster ride. He had her hanging on for _dear life_ , that took all the energy out of her person, god dammit _._

It was relaxing after that. He briefed that he got the hang of driving quickly, which is why he was able to do all of what he did. Ambrose placed a hand on her shoulder and Lexi almost jumped at the contact because _holy fuck he just touched her._

"Calm down." He assured. "If I didn't know what I was doing, I wouldn't have done it. You're in good hands."

She pulled his hand off of her because her face was getting hot, and he laughed _again_ , and she got annoyed at his hot ass laugh. Y'all see the struggle right now?

All that aside, entering Insula and finally reach the open fields of his perimeters was like entering _Oz_. She saw so much… futuristic shit that hasn't even been outed to the public yet, literally having the same reaction as Zamasu did when _he_ first stumbled upon here. He parked in front of his snazzy home, and opened his door for her to enter, Lexi took off her shoes and left them near his door. Once again, her butt found its way to his living room sofa, sinking into the softness of its material. _Already_ , she was starting to doze off.

"You don't wanna change or anything?"

"Hmm?" Lexi looked at him. He was standing just before his hallway. "I didn't bring any clothes with me."

"I have stuff that you can wear." He offered. "I don't think it'd be comfortable if you slept in jeans."

At this point, from the amount of work she'd done today, Lexi could fall asleep in an itchy wool shirt and a bin liner for pants with no problems. She narrowed her eyes and slowly sat up, her tired brain getting skeptical. "Why do you have female clothes?"

He shrugged. "I just… do."

She was squinting at him, but she did accept the offer and let him go while she watched his gait. Lexi could not imagine Ambrose… having _women_ in his house, at _all._ Even though he walks through the grounds of Desna looking like a six star course meal on a daily basis, she came to know and assume that Ambrose was somebody who didn't have a lustrous lifestyle. To know that he had clothing that she could wear points to a possibility that she never entertained before.

All she would have to say, aside from that stupid wishful part of her getting disappointed even though he's not hers, is that the women having affairs with him are probably the luckiest women alive at the moment.

Lexi looked at the abysmal ocean coffee table when Ambrose's tablet vibrated quietly. As if all of her suspicions were partially manifested, the screenlock background was a picture of him, and this _beautiful_ silver-eyed jet black haired woman who was doing a kissy face at the camera. Ambrose had a side smirk that made him look way too stupidly sexy but that's not what she was focusing on right now. He has… a girlfriend? A lover? Someone he sleeps with?

Why was she actually getting peeved off?

She continued to stare at the screen, obviously not attempting to unlock said tablet because it might have some Inkala-esque combination, but her brain was _going_ , and the more she looked at the pretty woman's face the more her polarized thoughts became poignant. Half of her was astounded by the fact that she's never seen this woman before; her features was exotic and she could _totally_ pass for a grand supermodel in today's age. But the other _screaming_ part of her hated how pretty she was, because she was with a hot ass dude who's rich, smart, has a God-crafted body, can sing, dance, and has a quirky sense of humor- like… does she need to go on?

She finally heard him coming back into the living room and placed the tablet underneath her thigh. When Lexi turned around, he had her aforementioned clothing in hand and was also wearing a slim fit pullover sweater and traditional Ananesian pants; in our world, they would resemble harem, or something Aladdin wore.

"Got it."

His innocent look made her arch a brow. "What is that?"

"It's like…" Ambrose took the clothing in both hands since he kinda didn't look to see what exactly it was, but knew it had to be a robe of some sort. "It's a maxi romper, I believe. Yup, it is."

It was in a dark blue, almost greyish hue… which looked like it would go well with the woman on his screen lock. It looked _expensive_ and beautiful, like it would suit her full curves but… that was on _this woman's_ body at one point. "I think I'll pass."

Ambrose blinked not because of her decline but because of the tone she suddenly adopted, even Lexi herself realized that she may have been a little too harsh. He folded the romper neatly. "Okay." Was his simple reply, and then he sat adjacent to her on another seat with the romper now beside him.

Lexi felt like pressing the topic at hand since… he didn't seem to care that his tablet was not on his coffee table. He obviously knew she couldn't get into it so that she could see more pictures of him probably hugging and kissing this woman on his screen, being all loving and cuddly with her, and yet confident enough to act like there was _nothing_ going on- "Are you sure you aren't with anyone?"

Ambrose was looking down at the folded maxi romper, feeling at the soft and _tempting_ material. Lexi would accept that over what she was wearing right now in a fucking heartbeat, but she didn't want to smell like another bitch.

Someone cool her down. Now.

He'd looked up at her with a confused blink this time, and then slowly shook his head. "Not at all."

"You're not? At all?"

"No. I am single." He affirmed, and he looked so sincere saying that, but the tablet in Lexi's damn lap said the opposite.

The trillionaire had the _nerve_ to lean back and rest his fist against his head in a leisurely manner. So now, she got the confirmation that this was someone he didn't want her to know about. Maybe he wanted to sweeten her up, that's why he was always so innocent, so that she wouldn't know about all the women he has under his finger at this moment. He was hot and rich enough to do so in the first place, what the heck could be stopping him? Lexi herself would've end up succumbing to his gentle and genuine ways, thinking that she was only his, when in reality she was just one in a dozen. That is _not_ going to fucking happen, this kind and gentle man in front of her was a _cheater_?!

"Why ask? … Are you okay?"

She snapped out of her thoughts hearing Ambrose's concern. She didn't want to hear that deceiving, sweet voice anymore. She whipped the tablet out from between her thighs and _showed_ him exactly what she saw, pointing at the woman's pretty damned face and leaning forward animatedly. "Then who is this?! Why are you making me wear your own girlfriend's clothes? She'd be very fucking upset knowing that you have another woman in your house, wearing something like _that_!" The tired woman pointed at the sexy folded romper. "I know we're business partners, and I know you know I have a big crush on you, but I'm not _stupid_ , I'm not a little toy for you to use. I've caught you red-handed already, now tell me _who_ the hell _is this woman_?!"

Lexi was done exploding; it was her exhaustion rendering this, because she normally wouldn't snap so quickly. But she didn't want to be so conceived under the idea of someone being so good of a human, that she gets _deceived_ by their sincere gestures.

Hey… Does that… _ring a bell?_

Everything she had come to know and understand was falling apart, and you may be thinking that something as simple as cheating shouldn't throw a person off their pedestal. Cheating _sucks_ , and it's a sad ass thing people do when they are confused and don't know what they want and how they want it. Lexi expected guilt, a face ridden like a deer caught in headlights now that she basically exposed him for something she surmised.

Instead… his face gradually held an expression that looked like she grew eighteen eyes on her clavicles.

Lexi placed the tablet down, having the respect to do so carefully because that shit _costs_ , and then she clasped her hands together confrontationally. " _What_? Why are you staring at me like that?"

Ambrose looked like he was just frozen in that relaxed position, his hand still propping his head up by his temple. He blinked _a few times_ and with a look that would have made her laugh her ass off, he said quietly; "Lexi... _that's my cousin_."

All that brewing fire in her body just vanished; _kapoot_ , there it go, and she was left looking _really_ dumbfounded. They both stared at each other for a long while until Lexi scratched the back of her head and casted her gaze away from the man that she just wrongfully accused of both cheating, and trying to pimp her out. "...Oh…"

 _Meanwhile_ , she had to look back at him because Ambrose just facepalmed loud enough for her to hear, and he fell into a fit of laughter.

"Ambrose! Tha-" Lexi couldn't even rebuke his warm laugh, she felt like such a dick for thinking he'd do that to her.

At this point, he had bent down until his head was near touching his criss-crossed legs still laughing, coming back up making his messy bunned hair swing up with him. "Is that what you were getting mad about?"

"Why is this funny to you?! I didn't mean-"

"I know, I know you didn't mean to just say that. It's just…" Ambrose came back up and shook his head with a sigh. "Yes, that is just my cousin. Her name is Nousha, and this," he took hold of the romper, "is what she bought some time ago but never actually tried so… that's why I gave it to you. I would never give you clothing that Nousha's worn before."

 _See how sweet he is?_ Why did she think he'd be a pig? Oh right… because much like Zamasu, she got possessive with him. He isn't even _hers_ for crying out loud, Lexi's with _Jay_. "Right… I..." She paused in guilt, then came back to her senses and realized she was talking to her hot business partner who was _the_ Kingpin of the world market right now. "I am so sorry I yelled at you like that! I-I went off at the mouth, and maybe it was because I wasn't thinking but I shouldn't have accused you of cheating or anything I know that's dumb to even assu-"

She felt a finger against her lips and froze. Ambrose shook his head with the tiny chuckle. "It's _fine_ , Lexi. You didn't mean it." He said, and then moved to sit next to her to put his arm around her shoulder. "You just need sleep."

"I'm not… I'm not that tired." Minus the blush on her face from feeling his taut arm around her shoulder, she foregone her runoff apology, but told him that _while_ yawning.

"Yes you are." Ambrose said. "Get comfortable; put that on and I'll take you to one of my guest rooms."

Lexi looked up at him but had to back away because she was practically less than a foot away from his face and… that's too close. "Ambrose, I can stay up for a bit longer-" Another yawn, and then she shook her head when he snorted. "Shut up."

He stood up and gestured for her to do the same, taking the romper with him. Lexi took a moment to look at his eccentric attire, because the fabric of both clothing articles looked and felt _so soft…_ "Come on, Lexi. I don't think it'd be nice if you doze off on my couch."

She stood up slowly, and then looked up at him with eyes that weren't as live as they were a few minutes ago. She was _shot_ right now. "That's really kind of you."

"How?" He asked, as they walked into his hallway.

"Because you're actually seeking out a spot for me to sleep in."

"Is that not… normal etiquette for someone sleeping at your place?" Ambrose furrowed a brow at her, and she suddenly realized how dumb she sounded just because she was thinking about how rich he was. Like, he has the almighty _privilege_ of being an asshole and just leaving her to doze off, but he provided her with something nice to wear _and_ a room to sleep in. Most people _already_ do the latter so… there was really nothing special about his actions.

"It is…" She looked down. "Don't… don't judge me."

"You're _tired_ , sweetie. Right here." He smiled at her, casually throwing a term of endearment as if she wouldn't get tomato-faced. The walk was short, and the room he gave to her was the one that was across and two doors down from his own room. "Take this. Goodnight, Lexi."

She walked in and her eyes wandered around the premise. This room was of light green colors which holy fuck… did he _know_ that that was one of her favorite colors?! Her room had a bathroom, and lights that lined the truncated ceiling beautifully. And her _bed_ … good lord it was big, like _fluffy_ big, with the amount of pillows that lined the top of the bed and how big and comfortable the olive green and white blanket was…

"Uhh…"

She turned around when she realized Ambrose was holding out the romper to her. "Oh! My-my bad." She giggled a bit and took the romper out of his hands. _It's so friggin' soft…_

Ambrose laughed. "Goodnight, Lexi."

"'Night." She smiled at him before he'd close her door. Lexi _quickly_ changed and the second her beautiful body was _served_ with this goddess romper she adorned, the model pounced on the bed and groaned loudly at how soft and warm everything on her was. Gripping the pillows and pulling them in to smoosh her face, she strangely felt… at home in this place, despite its interior and exterior looking nothing like she's ever seen before. Maybe it's because of the way the home was decorated, maybe it was just her tired brain running chorus lines in her head over how comfortable she was. Maybe it was just him, and his sweet… _everything,_ knowing that he was so kind spirited and rich and attractive and _still_ is single. Lexi scrunched her face, her cheeks started to burn.

 _Maybe I should just fall the fuck asleep now..._

* * *

Much to both Ollie and Loki's dismay, Zamasu had left Rebecca's house early the following day. Loki especially; once his dog ears picked up the sound of footsteps in the hallway he had readily assumed that that was his Godfather. Zamasu gave the early-bird canine a kiss against his nose (yes he _actually_ did that), promised he would come back, and teleported out of her house and into Irene's.

Fast forward a few days ahead, and now Zamasu's whole left eye had been twitching so much he reckoned he permanently cramped the muscles there, and it was because this _woman_ in front of him. Irene did not talk to him as much as she used to, but any interaction they had was _sour_. The roles have mildly switched; Irene was the one who was being grating towards him, and it probably was because the young God was on the phone with James at one point late at night, laughing and chatting like normal friends do.

The Kaioshin knew that her house was well insulated so Irene would not wake up from his voice, but he also could _sense_ the woman sitting on her steps and listening to him speak with James. He didn't turn around and address her that night because once he had hung up, Irene was gone.

He sat in the dining room sipping his tea and watching Irene, not out of spite but because he's been seeing her… change quite quickly. She used to dance and prance around whenever she cooked especially when he's right there just to piss him off, but now everything she did made her look like she was stressed. Irene would move around in an anxious pace despite having little to do, her entire vibe had changed in a matter of days now that she was single.

In her mind, the artist thought she'd feel so resolute in the way she handled her breakup. Ever since she heard Zamasu on his phone with James, she imagined what his voice sounded like, what his laugh sounded like, the times when he'd smile or roll his eyes… she wasn't going to see that. Ever.

Because he was a cheater. He cheated on her.

"Who were you on the phone with?"

Zamasu looked up from his phone, because he was reading an article from the GlobalBox which was basically Wikipedia… and the article was about Ambrose. Despite spending quite a _while_ with the trillionaire, he did not know where he came from or his lineage, but Zamasu readily guessed that he was from Anasa since those people's genetics render them with long hair on their heads, but barely any body hair. "Hmm?"

"That night when you were on the phone." She knew who he was talking to, god dammit. This happened _two days ago_. "Who was it?"

"It was James." Zamasu answered, eyes back on the article.

"In here?"

That question was asked with a calm tone but _bitch_ , was she really acting like he couldn't speak with his _boy_ in _her_ house? Well to be fair, it _was_ Irene's home, it would be quite disrespectful to enact something that wasn't tolerated in this space but… it was just a _Desnian human_ , and not even having to do with him actually being _in_ the house.

"Yes. In here." Zamasu said, now he sat up and looked at her, daring the woman to challenge him again. "Is there a problem with that?"

"We broke up." Irene was stirring something. Her stirring motions became more vigorous. "So we don't talk anymore."

A blink. James and Rebecca already relayed this information to him. "Alright?"

She put the spoon, or rather _dropped_ it, against the edge of her pot and turn around, facing Zamasu with an annoyed look on her face. "I don't want to be bothered with his existence so… if you want to speak to him, then go to his house."

"...Irene." Zamasu held his hand up, wrist planted against the dining table with his eyes closed, you know… the same expression you do before you go off on someone. "It was late at night, and I reckon you were asleep when James did call me. I'm not unaware of the fact that you sat by the stairs and listened to us talk to one another on your own volition. I was not being loud at all, but you purposely decided to mind what I was doing."

Irene did this thing where she fluttered her eyes up and down at him, and with a blink that poorly hid her eye roll, she rolled her head and changed her posture to stand by her countertop with her arms crossed.

 _This_ was where she got the God fucked up. "Are you giving me a bad look?"

"I don't know." She shrugged. "You tell me."

 _Oh, I'll tell you alright-_ Calm. _Don't fight fire with fire._ "Do I have to straighten you up, Irene? You think that no longer having a partner gives you the right to be stuck up?"

Irene took a breath. "I'm not being stuck up-"

"Yes. You are." Zamasu released his cup of tea that was in his other hand, because the chamomile in his cup represents calmness. The God was slowly losing his cool, residing in using his temperament to remind Irene that he's billions of times stronger than her. "I heavily refrain from hitting any human being unless they've pushed me to do so, and that's usually through physical means. Don't think I can't _broaden_ the range to that."

She snorted, feigning a jokeful manner to bring down the serious tone that Zamasu now adorned. As much as she could fake it, Zamasu could see that she was afraid, albeit slightly, but Irene wasn't backing out. "So now hitting someone who's weaker than you is not wrong anymore? That's not what martial artists do."

Is… is she _actually_ using his greatest asset against him? It wasn't like she said that seriously either but her humor had a nasty bite to it, and _nobody_ in their right mind takes what a genius _crafts…_ and uses that shit _against_ them. "I have no problem with _putting someone in their place_ , as you local mortals say it, apparently you're forgetting who you are talking to."

Even though he said that, he figured she was just… still moody, after a whopping _four-ish_ days that passed since she pulled the plug on her relationship, so he was making no move to hit her. His lack of action was solidified when he caught Irene's crossed forearms tense the _moment_ his green booty left the dining chair. There was no reason to hit her even if he wanted to, because as of now the 'fight' was over.

He was dealing with a coward in his eyes.

Before he took his leave to get out of this place, Irene turned the stove off, suddenly not feeling apt to cook anymore, and she left her things and went upstairs to sort herself out. The Kaioshin somehow felt like… this wasn't going to be the end of their quarrel. It might be the start to something more visceral, dangerous even; because Irene constantly looked as though she wanted to wreak havoc on everything, all because of a relationship. The Kaioshin didn't have to fear anything, she's a weak young human, and if she _tries_ him one more time, his 'young' ass will discipline her directly.

Instead of leaving out the door, Zamasu teleported out of the home, and flew to the one place he knew that could cure him of _any_ bout of irritation he'd have...

* * *

"Zamasu, _do not tickle me._ "

Sitting beside the 30 year old engineer in his home, Zamasu's green hand was resting on one of Ambrose's knees. The man was wearing hickory colored Ananesian pants, with his legs propped up so that his knees were against Zamasu's chest since the God was complaining about _human contact_ when Ambrose laughed at something. Zamasu discovered that Ambrose, when he finds something really funny, he laughs as though all of his bones lost their integrity. Meaning, he found Zamasu's whole person to be a viable body rest while his warm giggles filled the air. To spite Zamasu, Ambrose sat in this very close position with his book in hand, as if he totally wasn't impeaching Zamasu's protest.

Ha, jokes on him because Zamasu _did not forget_ about how ticklish he was.

Ambrose curled his toes like that was going to do something, even if his legs were practically leaning against the Kaioshin's torso. "I am reading."

"I won't, don't worry…" Zamasu voice trailed off before he placed a finger on the fabric of Ambrose's pants. His hand trailed down to where his lower calf was. He looked at the man who looked mostly unbothered, but his grip on the book was tight. Zamasu looked down at those beautifully slim, god-crafted feet, and he touched the bracelet around Ambrose's ankle.

That earned the faintest of giggles from the man beside him.

"Even _that_ tickled you?"

"I told you this already." Ambrose clasped the book down and looked at Zamasu, his high ponytail swaying. "My body is sensitive."

He must be really, really fun during sex. That's not Zamasu thinking that, this is the author saying it. Heh heh…

"Oh please, it can't be _that_ bad."

"It _is_ that bad." Ambrose argued. Zamasu couldn't help the smile on his face. "One time Chandler was walking and he accidentally poked me in the side with his tablet. He claimed that I've 'damaged his sound receptors' because how loud my laugh was."

Poking him by the sides makes him _do that?_ "Really?" Zamasu asked, and then he shook his head. "Maybe you shouldn't have laughed that loud then." The Kaioshin laughed when Ambrose raised his book like he was going to hit him.

The trillionaire pouted and shifted his weight off of Zamasu, removing his legs from the Kaioshin and sitting normally. "You're not nice."

"Yes I am, you don't need to do that." Zamasu reached down and grabbed both of Ambrose's legs to put them where they once were. That earned Zamasu a look of confusion with the pout still on his face, and much like with Alma, Zamasu wanted to spite Ambrose by pinching his damn cheeks.

"I thought you didn't like 'human contact'." Ambrose air quoted to the Kaioshin's earlier protest.

Zamasu shrugged. "I do not mind this." He pointed to Ambrose's legs. "What I _did_ mind was you using me as a bed when you laughed."

The trillionaire shrugged a shoulder. "That's how I laugh." He tilted his head, golden eyes became coy. "You should know that already. I… laugh at everything."

Zamasu batted his eyes. "That much is _proven_."

"How? By that _one time-_ "

"We do not _speak_ of that one time." Zamasu closed his eyes.

"It wasn't bad, Zamasu! You just… lost a bit of control-"

His statement ceased when Zamasu poked the side of one of his soft feet, instantly making him yelp. "What did I say about not speaking of _that_?"

Ambrose clutched the crap out of his book from that one move the green God pulled. Once he settled, he looked back at the Kaioshin with a smile that screamed that he was going to bring it back up, so Zamasu ran his finger up Ambrose's heel.

Literally trying to hold himself together, Ambrose reached over to swat Zamasu's hand away with his book, barely able to maintain a level voice from his own laughter. " _S-stoooop_!"

The Kaioshin stared at the annoyed, but chuffed expression on Ambrose's face as he kept hitting his hand and… perhaps it was just his brain placing images where they shouldn't be, but he could have _sworn_ he saw little Alma in those eyes. Ambrose threw himself back with a huff once Zamasu stopped, quickly opening his book and pursing his lips because Zamasu was being annoying again.

The God himself couldn't stop the imagery from coming; the pouting, the way he pursed his lips, how he acts and smiles… it reminded Zamasu so much of Alma. Alma was a bright child who knew so much at such a young age, that much is shown from the fact that she literally lives alone, and has matured greatly from what had happened between her parents. Despite how nice Ambrose looked, and how his life seems to be so golden all the time, Zamasu can see that this man was very emotionally strong, much like Alma is. Could it be that… she was _his_...?

"Ambrose." Zamasu looked at the post-annoyed engineer beside him, who now had the book up to his face so Zamasu couldn't see him anymore. _Cute_.

He still answered him though. "What?"

Zamasu let the smile on the face flutter before it cascaded, a serious question arising. "Have you… had any children?"

That sounded like a really stupid question because… "Zamasu, I live alone." Ambrose lowered the book so that Zamasu could see his confused face. "If there was a child, he or she would be running around here right now."

"Not here of course." Zamasu kind of circumvented Ambrose's answer, he wanted a definite yes or no. "But have you had one?" Zamasu expected him to answer vocally, but all Ambrose did was shake his head. The Kaioshin blinked downwards. "Oh."

There was a short stretch of silence. Ambrose tilted his head. "Why?"

Zamasu couldn't bring Alma's existence to Ambrose's concern. "I just wanted to know."

"It's not common for people at my age to have kids right now." Ambrose blinked. He was right though, most humans of Desna do not settle down with children until they are in their mid to late 30s since their life expectancies are pretty high.

Also, Ambrose is compulsorily sterile, he can't have kids. That, and the _reason behind that_ is something Zamasu would rather not know.

"Fair point. I was curious." Zamasu said, hinging the topic off quite quickly since Ambrose was child-less. He felt at the soft fabric of Ambrose's baggy pants while the engineer concealed his face with the book again. "Have you ever had any partners?"

"Partners?"

"Romantic partners I mean." Zamasu said, and then he straight faced. "There is no way you couldn't possibly have one."

"What makes you say that?"

"Because you know how to kiss." Zamasu didn't even think about the words that just came out of his mouth. After he said that, he stopped feeling Ambrose's pants and looked at the floor with a funny expression.

The engineer giggled. "You never had a romantic relationship but you know how to kiss." Ambrose moved the book down a bit to see Zamasu's look. "Are you blushing?"

" _No_." He nearly _ate_ Ambrose's whole face off that night. Never mind the warmth in his cheeks right now over that memory. "Do not talk about me, we're talking about you here."

"Why are you so curious of such a thing?"

"I just want to know." Zamasu said.

A pause. "I have." Came the engineer's simple reply, which left Zamasu unsatisfied. He wanted more to that answer. "Did something spark in you to ask me all of this?"

Zamasu nodded, he decided to come a little clean, just a _little_ , about his curiosity. Grey eyes looked down at the carpet, and then at Ambrose's feet absentmindedly. "I just thought of it. I've seen something about people who treat their partners horribly." Technically he did, he wasn't lying. "Of course, it's a pathetic thing that low-esteemed humans do, leaving themselves and their significant others in pain." And then he backtracked. "Not saying that any of that happened to you, of course, which I hope not, but my curiosity got the best of me. I don't know how those two thoughts sparked this conversation."

Ambrose wasn't reading his book anymore. The entire time, Zamasu was not overall looking at the man sitting next to him. As he went on about his reasons, Ambrose lowered the book so that only his eyes were visible to the God, and they narrowed warily; what was he getting at?

He watched the way Zamasu held his hand up in saying that he didn't wish such a thing, but those golden irises had such an intense look in them. Zamasu practically felt eyes on him at that point. The very second he turned to look at Ambrose, the engineer's face softened to something of confusion.

The book was still covering his face from his upper cheeks downward.

"...Has it happened?" Zamasu may have caught whiff of the look Ambrose was giving him, luckily he didn't face Ambrose _as_ he spoke. Otherwise, Zamasu would have visibly flinched under that gaze.

Ambrose made a tiny 'hmm' noise. "A little."

"A little?"

"A little." He repeated himself.

"How could someone betray you 'a little'?" His use of verbs was a little harsh perhaps, but Ambrose tinily smiled at him and wagged his finger.

"Things like that are meant to be kept private, Zamasu." Ambrose leaned to his side while closing his book and placing it against his stomach. It's not that he didn't trust Zamasu, but some things aren't meant to be brought up. Both occurrences of this betrayal, for both relationships, had left really bad inflictions on him before, but he did accept them as they were.

Sometimes, things just don't work out.

"Fine." Zamasu crossed his arms like a stubborn child. He could just threaten to tickle Ambrose if he didn't say anything more but that would be crossing the line. "You don't have to tell me about that situation but… can you tell me a bit more about the person?"

The Kaioshin just realized Ambrose had put his book down, because the engineer already knew Zamasu wouldn't shut up until he concludes this conversation. It didn't hurt to brief his past relationships, at least this one. "Well, she started working for me around seven-ish years ago; she was my secretary."

This was around the time that Rose Corp was marginally microscopic compared to what it is now. It was also an emerging superpower within the first two years of its launch; yes, this man owned a flourishing business at the age of twenty one.

That meant other forces _were_ trying to keep his business from progressing, and of all the bear traps he inadvertently avoided, she was the _biggest_ one.

"Really?"

Ambrose nodded, and looked elsewhere. "We became a thing like… within the first year, since we were always so close."

"You were attracted to her?"

A pause, and then Ambrose pointed with his fingers, now gesturing. "She started liking me first." He chuckled a bit, and started folding his hands together and swayed a bit, kind of like how a child would when they're explaining something. "We dated for over three years, and then we decided to get engaged. A time close to our marriage," he pointed, "was where things fell apart."

Zamasu really admired how Ambrose's words were always fitted with expression; when he said 'fall apart', the tiny smile on his face when recalling his own beloved engagement started to falter too. Aside from that, it really struck Zamasu in a bad place seeing Ambrose even mildly upset because… how the hell can you mistreat someone as pure and beautiful as _Ambrose_?! Come _on_ now, the man has such a giant heart and it is implied that he's been hurt by someone more than fucking once, why would they-

"Zamasu?"

The Kaioshin blinked. "Huh?" He saw a confused look on Ambrose's face.

"Why are you gripping my pants like that?"

Zamasu looked down and realized that he literally had a vice grip on the fabric of Ambrose's pants. "Uhh, I… I may have been a little angry at what you told me."

"I barely said anything about what happened." And with his vague story, he was making it seem like it wasn't as bad as it actually was. Because it was _really_ bad... there were _casualties_ involved.

"But still, I can't help the idea of anything good being tainted with hate and evil." Zamasu frowned.

A warm, _telling_ smile. "You're just being really protective."

Yes he is, and no he won't admit that to him. "It is not fair at all!"

Ambrose lightly sighed and he sat up a bit while resting both his arms against his hips, a gesture that would have looked like he was loosely hugging himself if he was standing. It's something that he does whenever he relives bad things. "What happened, happened. It's in the past now and I've moved on from it. I wouldn't wish anything bad on her either, she doesn't deserve it."

That sounded way too healthy, even given what she actually _did_ to him. Zamasu, still given barely any actual info, could see the body language Ambrose was displaying; even talking about her made him uneasy. From the looks of it, she might have cheated and maybe even backstabbed him in more ways than emotionally, and Zamasu was not having that. He'd find whoever this woman was and lambast her for fucking with him but he couldn't; Ambrose wouldn't want her reprimanded. It was strange to come across someone like that, given his position in the world, his wealth and his looks.

There was silence between the two as Zamasu thought it over. He looked at Ambrose inquisitively, what makes him think the way he does? "Why are you so good to people?"

Ambrose raised a brow at his sudden question. That's a weird thing to ask, at least to him, but the answer was so obvious. Even the way he worded it made him smile afterwards. "It's not nice to not be good."

Such a childlike response, if Ambrose was like ten years old Zamasu would no doubt claim him as his son. And Alma as his daughter too, they could both be _best friends_. "But, you can't let people hurt you like that."

Ambrose blinked and cocked his head to the side with a smile, a very small one that Zamasu was _not_ expecting. "Do you know where I'm from?"

The God frowned at the sudden question. He only briefed that knowledge from an article. "You're from Tsavannanee… Anasa. Why ask me this?"

"Because you're thinking that I'm someone to walk over." The smile became a smirk that _would have_ a tinge of sex appeal, but it looked like something more than that and Zamasu didn't know why until Ambrose spoke. "You can ask Chandler about this but people from the Tsavans… We take respect and loyalty to the highest regard; that includes things from friendships to engagements." He shook his head. "We are very passionate people. She has long gotten her comeuppance."

Oh, now that smile looked really dangerous. Not to Zamasu necessarily, but now it basically said _you don't want this smoke_. The Kaioshin could not imagine, if Ambrose did get angry at the time, how he would _look like_ after knowing this about his homeland. He'll definitely inquire Chandler on this. "...Oh."

Ambrose laughed, placing a hand on Zamasu's shoulder. His hands were pretty. "But I'm not mean or anything-"

"Excuse you?" Zamasu gave him a look. "Why would you think I would think _that?_ "

"I dunno! Because, if you… if you saw how I reacted when I found out about what she did, you'd…" Ambrose nodded his head and looked elsewhere, with a sheepish tinge to his gesture. "You would think otherwise."

"Is it not wrong to be upset over someone betraying you." Zamasu furrowed his brows. Of _course_ you'd be mad if a loved one double crossed you, he didn't understand why Ambrose looked embarrassed. "I'll assume you didn't hit her-"

"Oh no, not at all." Ambrose shook his head vehemently. "I refrain from hitting people, even if they try to hit me. I just don't like being mad."

It's a catastrophic thing to witness, whenever he is mad which rarely happens, but Ambrose would not tell Zamasu about that. Part of it came from his lineage, and the other part came from where he grew up, not where he was born. Also, he is really powerful; that had nothing to do with his wealth.

"What if they do hit you?"

Ambrose raised a brow in a tiny bit of thought, before shaking his head. "They probably can't."

"You mean to tell me that _no one_ can hit you?" Zamasu tilted his head. "Are your reflexes that fast?"

"Pretty quite fast." Ambrose shrugged humbly. Zamasu chuckled; the God knew that reflexes had nothing to do with power and he would bet that with Ambrose's versatile intelligence, that the man knew to dodge whenever he needed to. So Zamasu figured he had fast reflexes, but was just weak since he could not sense any significant power from the man before him.

...That would be a big problem for anyone, since it is being covered by Ambrose's lithe and toned frame and his 'pacifist' tendencies. Key word: _covered._

"Do you have any knowledge in martial arts?" Zamasu asked. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"I _knew_ you'd bring up martial arts." Ambrose smiled. "I do. I used to do a lot of that stuff with my cousins when I was younger, since I am an only child."

"Not anymore?"

"Nope. Not really." Ambrose shook his head before he pointed at Zamasu. "Don't think I forgot what I learned. We're all grown up now and do a bunch of different things, so we don't feel the need to spar. Like, even one them is now a gun expert, she doesn't find much fun in sparring anymore."

 _Gun expert?_ A _she?_ Zamasu sat up all of the sudden. "What is her name?"

Ambrose cocked his neck back. "Nousha?... What, I know you know her too."

Zamasu was about to speak before he held his hand up at the teasing response. "Shush it… and yes, I do. How do you know that?"

"Well, she called me one day, and told me she became friends with a green man who claimed to be a God."

Zamasu rolled his eyes. _Typical_ Nousha, and now that he thought of it… he could see striking similarities between the two; near flawless skin, long black hair, toned bodies, stunning eyes, how come he didn't think to ask about Ambrose's relatives early on? "You are her and Naz's younger cousin, then?"

"Mmhmm." Ambrose nodded.

Zamasu's smile grew all of the sudden. "I do recall Naz being a headache for her, but you being more than _twice_ that..." He raised a reprimanding finger. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Now Ambrose suddenly sat up, dropping the book by his side because _bitch first of all-_ "I am a _good_ baby cousin, okay? Don't listen to him, he's telling stories."

The fact that he said 'baby' cousin makes this whole thing even more adorable. They were a close-knit family. "Your elders know more about you than you do, _Ambrose_. If I find out that you're causing trouble-"

" _Naz_ starts it- okay look, me and him like… if you get us both together in one place then we're bound to become idiots. That's just how it is with us; but he and Nousha can't handle _my side_ of the family."

Zamasu laughed, he was referring to his father's side, the _Sarashina_ side. "And what's wrong with your side?"

"Nothing _wrong_ with us, we're just…" Ambrose sat back, suddenly becoming quiet as he casted his gaze downwards. "We're all crazy."

"Crazy?"

"Crazy." He reaffirmed. "It runs in our blood."

The Kaioshin snorted. "You're pretty tame to me."

Ambrose shook his head, casting into a short laugh. "You don't know me."

 _Well then_. "You sure about that?" Zamasu knew he was right, even though he could spend hours talking to this one man, he will always remain a mystery. Maybe that's the same thing with his relatives, at least the 'crazy' ones.

"Very." He clasped his hands. "That's not to be negative at all. You haven't been around me for a year or so, regardless of you being a God or not. Go and ask Chandler how I am."

" _Fine_ , how about you contact him right now?" Zamasu crossed his arms.

"You can just teleport into the joint offices, you already know what they look like."

"I want to stay here." Because he's kind of lazy right now and Ambrose's legs on him felt comfortable, and he will not admit that even though the look on Ambrose's face said that _he_ knew. The trillionaire reached for his tablet, which was on the coffee table and he did this extracurricular ass stretch to get it since his position was too comfortable as well. He tapped a few things and soon, Chandler was on the line.

"What do you want, Ambrose?" Chandler didn't even greet him with a 'hello', and the tone of his voice sounded like a mildly irked father who knows their beloved child is just out to annoy them again.

"Chandler, I need you to answer something for Zamasu here, since he does not believe me." Ambrose shot a look at the Kaioshin.

Zamasu reached over to take the damn tablet from the man's hands, making him giggle. " _Ahem_ … Ambrose has told me that he is someone with a crazy streak to him, and I think he's lying. He's always very calm and collected." Zamasu looked at the screen. "Is this true?"

There was a _long ass pause_ because Chandler, on the other hand, literally stared at his phone wondering if he should either brace Zamasu with the fact that he is _dead wrong_ , or if he should apologize on behalf of the God because the Kaioshin was heavily uninformed.

"Zamasu…" Chandler kept opening and closing his hands, holding his loosely clenched fist in front of his mouth as if he was right in front of him. "Ambrose does not have a crazy streak… it is _ingrained_ in his DNA. If you think for a second, that he is a normal, level-headed human being that isn't loud and insane and _unpredictable_ …" The AI could _hear_ Ambrose's small giggles, he knew he was on speaker. "I feel so bad for you."

Damn, he had to do _both_ in order to really cement his claim.

Zamasu shook his head, as Ambrose's animated gestures were coupled with 'See?! Told you so.' He decided to spite the man now. "Then it must be _hell_ to deal with this one, isn't it?"

While Zamasu got a book to his arm over that statement, Chandler shook his head. " _You don't even_ _ **know**_."

"Alright, okay, I think he gets it." Ambrose took the tablet away from him. "Thank you Chandler."

"You're very welcome."

"Also, can you-" Ambrose moved his legs from Zamasu to turn around and away from the God, much to the other's confusion. He spoke in a quiet voice. "Fruit Freezys?"

He didn't need to ask the full question for Chandler to know what he was talking about. Fruit Freezys were basically frozen fruits glazed with assorted fruit syrups because Ambrose is addicted to fruits. _Literally_.

The AI sighed, because that's a lot of work to do. " _Fine…_ " It was literally a 35 minute drive from Rose Corp to West City, but that meant having to leave the megaway and going back in again which… is a lot of work, but he'll still do it for the 30 year old. "After I'm done. Goodbye."

Ambrose smiled. "Thank you. I'll see you soon. Bye." He ended the call and looked at the Kaioshin. "What?"

A blink. "What was that all about?"

Ambrose raised a brow. "It was business stuff."

"Business?"

"Mmhmm."

" _Fruitful_ business?"

The engineer narrowed his eyes playfully, because that could mean more than one thing. "Yes."

With that being said, the engineer opened his book again. Zamasu continued to look at him; he may have unearthed a side to this man that he didn't know, or could fathom, existed. Ambrose was a very animated speaker, the man gestures and moves around a lot as if he's living with his words. Is that how the Tsavan people are like? He really wanted to see to what extent Ambrose meant by crazy; assuming that Chandler had to apologize for Zamasu to think _otherwise_ , Ambrose must be _quite the screwy_.

He really shouldn't expect so much, Ambrose in our era would be seen as a terrifically mad scientist.

"When do you plan on going home?"

The Kaioshin looked at him, and he realized his brain had associated Irene's house as 'home' automatically. That's weird. "Once you fall asleep."

"Uhh…" Ambrose gave him a look. "I dunno about all that. I might not sleep for a long time." Like a child, Ambrose could stay up doing what he always loves and then when it's time to sleep, he's _out like a light_ in less than two minutes.

Zamasu smiled, unintentionally pulling Ambrose's legs back to where they were and bringing them a bit close. The engineer already knew what his answer to that was going to be, and the Kaioshin wasn't afraid to say it this time: "Then I'll stay here until then."

* * *

So not only did she end a relationship, but she had her invite to that party revoked.

Upon ending their friendship, Irene had called the host and told him personally that Rebecca should be exiled because 'she might cause problems'. That wouldn't have been much a problem for her but technically, Rebecca wasn't even _supposed_ to be there.

She may have invited Irene, who told her that she had already been contacted but wasn't resolute on going, but Irene was actually contacted by the _host_ for her invite. Yes, she was a new millionaire, who's income was increasing drastically due to her hard work, but compared to the likes of her fellow richer friends, Rebecca was really nothing. Besides, the majority of the people there had net worths that were above 100 million Zent _minimum_ , and she barely crossed over two digits to that fold. She was able to get in viably through her friends and their own wealth; if it weren't for that, she wouldn't have heard about the party in the first place.

She knew it happened when she called the host and the host instantly asked, after getting her name, how she had that number. He told her that she was removed from the guest picks list (just a list of uninvited people the host pick brings) by Irene, and the doctor nearly flipped on the man for his uninvolved reasoning. Even if the reason was petty, Rebecca can't just tell him to add her back in to the list because she wasn't invited by the _host_ directly.

So she settled; he knew how she looked like and she knew the man was one of _those_ billionaires, literally the exact opposite of Ambrose in terms of libido. If offered sex, he'll get it. Rebecca used that… ulterior knowledge to make him succumb to her request instead of stressing over it. It wasn't anything anyway, Rebecca herself hasn't had some in a while, so it was like killing two birds with one stone.

No the fuck it wasn't, the guy wasn't even good. Even if she had gotten off, it wasn't good enough to her tastes, and it left her a bit salty. It wasn't an action she _had_ to do, but right now, she wanted vengeance.

Driving back home from the host's mansion, Rebecca had one hand on her wheel and the other squeezing a stress ball. Was this how Irene called quits on her friendships, by making everyone else hate the person too? By _hell_ , she did not want her reputation to be dirtied by something as dumb as some brat's life not going the way she wanted it to be; matter of fact, it was always fun to watch how foolish her friend looked whenever she didn't get what she wanted.

Rebecca's eye twitched with a bitter smile, her mind thinking back to what she just did or rather _who_ ; she technically may have fed into whatever Irene told him just because they fucked for her approval. The woman shook her head and shoved the thought out of her mind, she didn't like thinking that she 'lost' at all.

Once she reached a stoplight, in which this would be the last one until she reaches her house, she pulled out her phone and contacted a number she's kept safeguarded for anything revolving around James. The group of guys for this had another man that could very well be the basketball's doppelganger once given the right lighting and anything higher than breath-distance, and she really planned on using him for some sort of 'financial sabotage', maybe to get James sued, but tonight she had a better idea. She didn't need James in order to break him, _Irene can do the job for him_.

"Hello?"

The gruffy voice on the speaker was heard, Rebecca knew this was the really tall guy, the one that looked like a bodyguard. "Hi."

"Is it time?"

"Nope." She shook her head. "But there is somebody that I need you to take care of." The light turned green, she started driving again.

"Who?"

"I'll give you the profile after I'm done driving." Rebecca said. "Just know that it's all open arms, do what you violently can… Just make sure she's not dead in the process..."

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **OUCH. Does Rebecca wants Irene to get beaten up too? Find out next time on- I'm not boutta rip off DB's suspense moniker. Not today.**

 **This dude Ambrose is full of surprises lmao. The shit you can do when your IQ is in the near 600s. Initial D fans represent!**

 **So yes, Nousha is Ambrose's cousin, not his girlfriend. And Zamasu has cleared up that part of Alma's family, or so he believes.**

 **It has been briefed that B.A. had some sort of relationship with Ambrose. Just know that, and what she did will come around very soon.**

 **There are some of us who have been waiting to see Irene get her comeuppance, she's been an absolute shit for the past few chapters; be careful what you wish for. See you in the next one!**


	46. Undeserving

**This is gonna be pretty short.**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

 **Undeserving**

 **«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»«•»**

Irene already bought the outfit she would wear; it was Rosé brand bodycon pencil dress that suit her petite body quite well. With the help of Lexi, the artist was able to get the right shoes and earrings for the pristine white lace dress. Now the dress was sitting on her mannequin clothing display in her room, just west of her bed, and she was laying down texting a few friends of her excitement.

She informed Adrian and Jay of her breakup, and then realizing that they already knew from James, and became especially tight lipped on the subject when she told Jay. It was like the Mandalan could _sense_ that she was going to press the both of them for whatever James said to them during their relationship, so when she said that and a little bit more he completely shut the shit down. Not in a way to make her hate him, but he was rather kind with his choice of words.

 _ **It was what it was.**_ And he cut it off right there with that sentence.

She felt rather peachy now, not really thinking about her ex or her snake friend but her mind trailed across the past five months. The day after the party would mark the sixth month of Zamasu's stay, and she didn't know why she specifically remembered that. Maybe it was because he used to shove it down her throat back then, saying that at the six month mark he would literally leave her house 'forever and find better, more competent people to exist near'. In a sense, maybe he was right because right now he wasn't here, and he also said she was acting out over being 'cheated' on.

Maybe he was right about her being incompetent, but Irene could spit in the face of that comment, because she had _more than enough_ stories of his incompetence during the first few months of his stay. He was literally childish, this guy would move to the other side of the sofa if she sat adjacent to him. Irene did nothing wrong then and now, and if he tries to instigate anything then he's an idiot.

While Zamasu recently remained healthily impartial on his opinion of Irene, which shows in how he doesn't actively insult her in person, Irene had developed a toxic attitude to him, knowing she can push his buttons because she can, _and_ because he's too controlled to check her in a way that'll make her shut up.

Sometimes, people _do lose_ control though. Irene has just been betting that he'll just hold his tongue _and_ his palm.

In regards to the Kaioshin, he arrived at Nousha's home late in the morning, just shy of 11am. The gunslinger wasn't in the house at the time, but her brother Naz was there. They drank tea and had a sweet conversation about sparring sessions. He wasn't thinking about Irene either, but every now and then he would wonder how Rebecca was fairing all alone. Sure, she had her dogs, but they aren't sapient.

He was hoping she wasn't doing anything horrible at the moment.

He learned more about the planet's history from Naz; the man had no problem telling him how the world was prior to the big war. According to what he kenw from his grandparents, a _lot_ of government crime was hidden beneath representatives, false flag new reports, martial terror, and overall a surge of misinformation. People believed too hard in 'things staying the same while crying and bitching for change', as Naz puts it, and that was a microcosm to a bigger problem that costed many lives. While outrage and excitement was going about, a new law was passed or a previous law was removed, people were being booted out of their homes, children and women alike were trafficked by billionaires… it was a crazy time. To think that all of these things were going on while more than 90 percent of the population were unaware was scary.

The chef agreed though, to a thought that Zamasu had realized he foregone, that the Seven Years War was a restart button for the world. "A viable one," Naz raised a hand and dropped it back on his thigh, "I'm not trying to be messy or chaotic; there were too many people who didn't _know_ how the world worked and couldn't know because they refused to know. And I think that was what the Prime government wanted to happen since there was no way they could rally up 12 billion people against the faulty elite."

The Prime government was the first formation of a regime after the Seven Years War. They were once the blacklisted officials a century ago, ones that had no say in what was really going on. They had to wait, at least until something huge happened, to make everyone realize that the world was _not_ okay and that they could do better to maintain peace. Now the majority of their children took their imported knowledge and are now maintaining the world globally; funnily enough that was what the old regime 'strived' for.

"I know what you meant." Zamasu nodded. "Did you think that there were more ways to change the world, besides war?"

Naz snorted. " _Yeah right,_ the majority of people back then were more outwardly savage than now." The pink haired man shook his head. "You'd be surprised when I say this but... a lot of them _accepted_ the mayhem, and were proudly the blame of it. The public would swear up and down that killing is bad, but they would have no problem imparting such a fate on someone they hated. A lot of the world back then was filled with proud hypocrites."

Zamasu did _not_ expect that response. It was even a little harsh for him. "So that was _the end_ , you think? Mass bloodshed?"

"Everyone was desensitized. They wouldn't care about death or torture or anything unless they themselves, or someone close to them, was experiencing it." Naz casted a gaze downwards. "The first event to spark the war was when a Prime Minister that the majority of the population hated was assassinated. There was so much buzz about it, but everyone was proud of his death and celebrated his fall as a sign that _good change was coming_." Zamasu physically cringed, that is _insane_. Naz started to snicker out of cruel humor. "You could imagine the looks on their faces, when they realized that an entire city was being burnt down a week later. And then Kiliken and Mandala went to war soon after, followed by every other country. Such is Desnian humanity."

What a fitting quote, _such is humanity_. Zamasu himself detested mortals for the _same_ reasons that Naz stated, and it hasn't even been a full century since that mess occurred… What does that say about his beliefs? Was he right in believing that mortals, at the end of the day, were nothing more than hungry, fearful primates? Has he been right in knowing that mortals, once struck with repetition, can never be as peaceful and compromising as his own species, the ones that they were made in the image of?

This conversation was like a tiny tap on his shoulder, a snap of fingers to his face, a voice calling in his ears bringing him back to what he objectively saw and believed nearly half a year ago. Naz, and his biteback bittersweet humor, was not sugar coating Desnians and their mistakes like the others did. It was like he was a partial outsider who dropped an opinion on a group he doesn't associate with.

Rightfully so, both Nousha and he were only half-humanoids. Zamasu doesn't need to know that.

Weirdly enough, the Kaioshin could not classify it as self hate, which was something that he felt in himself for a while because his species' creations weren't good enough in his eyes; Zamasu felt like _he_ was part of a failed species for having to bear witness to brutal evolution. Against his defense, such would project as a human who would feel self hate for the wrongdoings of his members, for the failures in their civilizations, for the gene pool being muddied because Darwinism wasn't working as well as it did anymore.

That human would discount themselves from those mistakes, because they _personally_ didn't make it. That's what Zamasu has been trying to do, and it was hard to break that belief because of his need to take responsibility. He was going to be the creator of this universe; the healthiest thing to do was to take those mistakes, learn from them, and improve the craft that is this world. Doing _that_ though, was difficult.

"They were right though." Zamasu deduced. "Good change did come. They just no longer are around to see that." Then he paused. "How many seniors are alive right now?"

Naz thought for a bit. "From what I remembered when randomly looking it up, less than two percent of the world are above the age of 65." He took a sip of his tea. "I think there are a handful of people that are like 80. The majority of the older population died from the wars' aftermath."

 _Geez_. "What about you guys? When you were younger, there was still anarchy going on."

"Well," Naz took a moment, now situated in a comfy position, "Where I and Nousha lived, in Tsavananee, we were the least affected by the war itself."

A blink. "How? Because your people didn't fight?"

"No, because we live three thousand feet above sea level."

 _Oh…_ A longer blink now, he didn't know that the Tsavans were at a high altitude like that. He and Ambrose were born in such a daring location? "Really?"

"Yeah, not to mention we weren't involved with the rest of the world per say, like," He clasped his hands, "There is no Web or anything up there, all of us are practically farmers which is… not a surprise because Anasa is just nothing but farmers."

Zamasu cracked a smile, he knew that part. He's seen comic strips about the countries and their stereotypes. "I imagine they were like this before the war too."

"Oh, we've been agriculture heavy throughout human history." Naz smiled. "It's ingrained in all of our bloods to know how to fertilize basic dirt. My father once did it in his sleep."

"Your father is Ambrose's direct uncle, correct?" Zamasu asked.

"He and Ambrose's mother are siblings." Naz smiled. "I knew you'd ask about my baby cousin."

Why does his chest get warm whenever Ambrose is referred to as the 'baby cousin'? "What makes you say that?"

"Ambrose tells me about his run-ins with you." The chef folded his hands. "Anytime he's mentioned I'm sure your pearls tense a bit."

 _Shut the hell up_ , that is such a wrong thing to say out loud. "Naz!"

"My bad, my bad. Just sayin-"

"Just saying, nothing!" Zamasu crossed his arms. " _Anyways_ , you are his cousin on his mother's side. How was she like?"

He was interested to see how Ambrose's parents were like. Boy, would he be _elated_ to meet them.

"She's a sweet, sweet woman. Like I'm telling you, literally the nicest person to ever walk on this planet." Naz started, "But much like her husband, or Ambrose's father, she was quite savage too."

"How savage?"

"She wrestled a bram before. True story, Nousha and our cousins witnessed it."

A _bram_ is akin to our rams. They only exist in the Tsavans, and are twice as big, twice as mean, twice as loud, and _five times_ as angry. "A _bram_? How strong was she, Naz?!"

Naz started to laugh. "There is a Hash about us Tsavananese people; we are the only group of people in the world that no one ever wants to fight."

" _Right_ , you all have lava flowing through your veins." Zamasu shook his head. "Maybe that is where Ambrose got his 'craziness' from?"

" _No it is not_." Naz shook his head. "He got that shit from his dad, god dammit. The Sarashina bloodline is filled with crazies, all of Anasa knows this. The majority of them always had some insane defining factor about them." Haz sat up, in the same fashion Ambrose did whenever he's animated about something. "If you mix the Sarashina's insaneous trait with the Hasti's vehemous trait, you get Ambrose."

"Fury?" Zamasu frowned. "He's never been angry."

"Fury doesn't always have to be angry. It just means overall turbulent. Trust me, he's _unpredictable_."

"Alright then, I don't doubt you." Besides, if Chandler had to apologize for a _fact_ , then you know it's real. "Goodness, we have gotten way off track. How did we get here?"

"You brought up Ambrose."

Zamasu threw an accusing look. " _You_ brought up Ambrose! I just _supplanted._ "

"Bullshit." Naz shook his head with a laugh. Zamasu knew damn well he himself started it. "So, back on topic: hmm, yeah so, since Tsvananee is in the 'No Touch Zone' of the planet, the Tsavans weren't really affected by the radiations and things of that nature." Tsvananee sits in a perfect place where the atmosphere can literally cancel out radiation. It was coined as one of the wonders of the world just because of this.

"Interesting…" He somehow made a connection to something completely irrelevant, but midkey similar, because they were on the subject of impenetrability. "There is a… an island I think; it's very unusual looking and really tall. It almost look like a small piece of a really tall mountain."

Naz immediately knew what island he was talking about; Sruy Venka. He asked more questions to make it seem like he didn't know. "A weird island?"

"Yes. It was a place where supernatural things happened." He looked at the chef, who masked his face in confusion. "It seems like no one is talking about it, I just came across its information, or what people could find of it, on the Web."

"I feel like you actually went there, with how curious you are." Naz smirked, playing with the fact that Zamasu was like a curious cat.

Amongst the inhabitants of Sruy Venka, all of them knew or saw that Zamasu had tried to breach into their homeland. It was sent out to all of the people who were born on Venkan ground on the same day it happened. Naz and Nousha were informed and knew of everything that happened to Zamasu, but refused to impart any knowledge. That island is none of his, and the rest of human populations' business.

"I _may have_." Zamasu admitted.

"How close?"

"I saw greenery. And that was it. Didn't see anything else." It was like one of those fuzzy visions you have in your dreams too. Zamasu can vaguely recall the scenery as being something out of literal heaven, but it looked very foggy and dreamy with how dazed he was, almost _unreal_. "Is it a hushed topic? How come people haven't put more attention to it?"

"The island kills." Naz jokingly said, but he was serious. "We say that it is protected by something, and literally no one can go near or into it. Everyone just leaves it as is."

Sruy Venka was being protected by the living individuals, _and_ by the energies of the dead Mystics that delegated their power to keeping the island as far from normal humanoid reach as possible. It is a safe haven for its members, for the _Mystics_ themselves.

"That doesn't mean you should go there again, Zamasu."

Even if the curiosity could burn his pinky toes off, everything in Zamasu's body protested against such an idea. It weirded out the Kaioshin, like it wasn't even his brain saying no, it was his _body_ and his gut intuition saying no. There's a force to be reckoned with up there.

"I'm not, I'm not. Don't worry about me."

"That sounds contradictory."

"I'm not inclined to go near that place, I just wanted to know why no one speaks of it." He said. "Maybe one day you humans will build technology viable enough to research what's in there..."

Naz made an _mmm_ sound in impartial agreement, but he knew no amount of primitive human technology could scratch the surface of that place. The inhabitants themselves were too strong to be detected by anyone, their ki signatures were completely different from the normal humanoids. Zamasu probably could distinguish the differences _especially_ in Nousha's because she does a more lousier job in masking her energy than Naz does. Sometimes, because she's an asshole, she lets it flare for half a second and then laughs when they feel a tremor deep in the ground.

The normal humans… they could _stay where they're at_ and not go near the island. Its people shouldn't concern them anymore.

* * *

Terry's shopping trip at Nilan took more out of Ethan than he expected. He didn't know that Terry was practically a bookworm when it came to shopping for clothes, specifically designer high-end clothing. This man gave him all the details of nearly every suit they came across, and commented on their shapes, decorations, fabrics, you name it. It was a whole different side of Terry that Ethan didn't expect to see.

After their long day of looking at beautifully tailored suits, they parted ways outside of Ethan's home. Terry offered to drive him to and from Nilan since he knew that Ethan was a very passive driver; passive drivers didn't, and shouldn't, exist in Nilan.

He drove back to his own home, a villa located just before a marsh in South City, took off his shoes and did his whole homely routine. A nice shower, some comfortable pants and a sweater, and a toasty cocoa float in a mug. It was _his_ time to relax right now.

While the cocoa was brewing, he got out his favorite deluxe mug along with vanilla cream and some chocolate shavings. At this point his kitchen held the faint scent of rich and warm chocolate. Revering the aroma, he walked back into his living room; there were no wall windows, unlike most Desnian homes nowadays, but one could clearly see the upstairs hallways. Only the hallway leading to the living room's entrance had wall windows by the door, showing a glimpse of his front lawn behind the curtains. He didn't see anything outside.

The very moment Terry's butt hit his sofa, the sensor went off. Somebody was in his front lawn.

The doctor felt a familiar shake in his gut, the same fear that he felt on those weeks where he was being stalked. He thought somebody from the black van gang was there, which didn't make any sense because that meant this person was able to get through his gates, and the gates didn't go off. Maybe he was going crazy…

 _Nope_ , it went off again. At this point Terry had to go see what was causing this problem. It can't be wind, which some sensors tend to go off from at times, it wasn't even windy out. He went into the entrance corridor, pulled the curtains to take a look-

He opened his damn door, because the green God was not facing him. He was the one who triggered the motion sensor, and apparently found intriguement in the front yard aquarium around the stepping stones.

"Zamasu!"

The Kaioshin, once again, accidentally stumbled upon a premise that belonged to somebody he knew. This wasn't done on purpose, he just saw this front lawn and thought it looked exquisite. He turned around once he heard his name in a bit of surprise, while also being reminded of how bad his habit of teleporting everywhere was. "Hello."

"Why are you here- how did you even find my house?"

"I stumbled upon it." Was his honest reply, even though he phased through his well-secured gates. "I just thought this garden was gorgeous."

He sounded so normal for nearly scaring the shit out of Terry. "Well… well thanks, but don't just pop up at people's lawns. You'd scare them."

Zamasu acknowledged what he was saying, but the God was purposely acting like it wasn't a big deal. His face turned up when he started smelling the air around him. He faced Terry with a look. "I smell chocolate."

Terry blinked, the God was deflecting from the fact that he just spawned into his front yard uninvited. "...Is that the _only_ thing you _have_ to say?"

Zamasu nodded with a smirk, accidentally breaking his nonchalance. Terry shook his head, he knew the God meant no harm and that this behavior was quite standard if you really knew Zamasu. He practically did the same thing to Ethan, the admin had told him such happened twice.

"I have hot cocoa brewing at the moment." Terry said. He could laugh at the way Zamasu's face slightly brightened at the mention of _cocoa_. "Do you want?"

Zamasu didn't even say yes, he was already walking towards Terry's door knowing the doctor would offer already.

Despite the weird encounter, Terry didn't mind bringing the Kaioshin in for a minute or two, at least for some small talk. It's not like he was lonely or anything, the man had his coworkers, Ethan and many others, he just felt compelled to have Zamasu around him. Also, watching the God hold in his foodgasm while drinking hot cocoa was a hilarious sight to behold.

"How have you been?" Zamasu asked.

"I've been great, nothing particularly new is happening." Terry shrugged. "Me and Ethan went shopping for his suit. We are having a party soon."

He didn't think Zamasu would compromise the 'secret' behind the rich people party, since it was insanely exclusive to people who were within the top one percent. Zamasu was priceless though, and he wouldn't run off and tell others about things.

The Kaioshin raised brows. "Really? When?"

"Tomorrow."

"Isn't he supposed to do that stuff days _before_ a party?" Zamasu furrowed his brows.

"We both share a trait of being resolute in our choices, so even though it took hours, Ethan finally found something that suited him. He's never worn luxury clothing before."

"That's nice." Zamasu thought back to Ethan. Compared to the first time they met, to the last time he was in the man's car, he changed quite a bit. He spoke differently too, Zamasu could imagine that working at the biggest corporation as an admin was whipping him into shape. "Nothing strange occurred?"

"No, not at all. I've been fine, better than ever."

The last part of that answer sounded resolute, almost petty. "Thomas has told me about you and Rebecca."

Terry thought it was a coincidence that Zamasu quickly caught on to his thoughts, and then he remembered that the God is telepathic. "Well yeah, that was a bit of a bummer but thinking back on it, I think it was a healthy thing on my part. Especially because she refused to at least support me when I was helping her out." _That was a sign of selfishness_ , he thought.

Zamasu could agree that Terry did look a lot less stressed than before, at least _marginally_. Again, he's a doctor with a big heart, he feels everyone's safety is his responsibility. It's humans like him that make Zamasu think otherwise about how trash they are. "Hmm…"

"I mean, it isn't anything negative; I'm not wishing anything bad on her just because of it. In hindsight, we just had a falling out." Terry justified. He placed his mug down and regarded his phone once it vibrated. Zamasu really admired how easy Terry foregone the entire ordeal, but he still worried much about Rebecca because unlike Terry, she had no one to turn to, and Zamasu, even though he prides himself on being a God, can't promise to be there whenever she needs company all the time. He's well aware of the fact that he can't do _everything_ even if he tried. She needs somebody, anybody of her race, to at least talk to.

He chose not to worry so much about it, figuring that things would even out eventually.

"What is that?" The Kaioshin pointed to a book that sat on the glass coffee table. The book had a human skull on it.

"Oh, that was a book I found in my parents' house. It's an anatomy mega-cyclopedia." Terry said as Zamasu picked it up, and cocked his neck back once he opened to a random page. " _Yes_ , the font is very small."

If Zamasu was human, he'd need a damn magnifying glass to read this book at a normal pace. "Did you read this entire book?"

"Yep, like… 21 years ago." Terry smiled. "I got it when I was 18 from this one guy who owned an antique book store. The book itself was fairly new at the time too, the man's son bought it and gave it up after he made a career switch."

Rebecca had a book like this except newer, smaller and less condensed than this. This version was 26 years old, and apparently denoted literally _everything_ about the human body; from the bones, to the tissues and muscles, to the types of fractures, torsions and tears that could exist and how to spot them, and underlying symptoms of autoimmune diseases. It was like a computer put into paper. "This is insane."

"Yup. It was the _medical student starter pack_ all in one, as we called it back in the day." Terry smiled, like the nostalgia was hitting him. Zamasu can identify that feeling; when he was much younger, he and the other Shinjin would sneak the 'big boy' books from their mentors and read them in secret. They didn't understand much of what these magical pamphlets entailed, but it was worth it for their hungry minds especially since they were training for a future where they can lead one day. He still remembered how he'd snatch one of Gowasu's records and sit in his room with an energy lamp under the covers, and then Gowasu would later come to him and ask why the pamphlet was in the wrong place on his shelf because Zamasu was bad at lying. Those were good times…

It's funny how he's sitting with someone who is ten years away from being middle aged reminiscing his younger days, even though in his species standards, Zamasu was technically _much younger_ than Terry's age. If his timeline were shrunken into human lifespan, Zamasu would be a little under Ethan's age.

"You look like you're deep in thought."

The Kaioshin was mostly looking at Terry while thinking. "I could say the same for you."

The doctor smirked. "Time flies, man." He is right, time does fly… the six month of Zamasu's stay will be marked in literally two days, and yet he felt like he's already spent a whole year here. "You're not a stranger to that."

"Not at all." Zamasu shook his head. "But I'm young by my own species' terms."

"Well, you still got a long way to go then." Terry patted Zamasu's shoulder like he was actually twenty two years old. Zamasu could have found offense to that, but instead he found it endearing. "Don't get too caught up in growing up while you're at it."

Zamasu was a young adult, and he has always been hardpressed to grow up. Not by Gowasu, but by himself; because he felt like if he acquired all the information at a young age, he'd be an amazing God to his universe. He is still coming to terms with knowing that knowledge can _wait._ With that being said, a part of him would be excited to hold the universe in his palms, but a smaller portion of him still felt like he wasn't ready, and he didn't want to be ready now.

Maybe that was the beauty of apprenticeship.

"I wouldn't." The Kaioshin assured, he casted a smile downwards. This conversation felt very warm, like a young man talking to an elder. His pride pushed aside the numerical case of their age, it felt nice. "Don't get too caught up in getting old either."

"Do you know how hard that is?" Terry leaned forward. "Sometimes I forget where I put my keys and wonder if I have reached that stage yet. I still check for grey hairs every once in a while… no pun intended."

He shot a look at Terry, obviously the man noted the color of Zamasu's hair. " _Fair enough_."

The two subsided, comfortable in silence now with Zamasu going back to looking at the book. Terry on the other hand was drumming his fingers against his mug. He figured Zamasu was extremely intuitive, since he could discern thoughts without a problem. Maybe Terry was being skeptical, but he really wondered if Zamasu shared the same sentiment of suspicion towards Rebecca. The doctor couldn't help jumping back to her because she was so… _odd_. "Have you spoken with her recently?"

Zamasu knew who he was talking about. "Yes, but it was a fleeting night after an incident."

More silence, as Terry shifted nervously. Zamasu flicked his gaze to the doctor every now and then, he was suppressing something. It wasn't long until Terry spoke again. "Zamasu?"

Zamasu's eyes were still glued to the book though. "Yes?" There was a heavy, drawn out silence that made Zamasu look up from his book, seeing Terry's pensive face. He frowned. "What is it?"

Terry opened his mouth but closed it, thinking he would imply the wrong thing by his choice of words. He just wanted more than one pair of eyes to speculate just as much as him. "Can you… keep an eye on her?"

The Kaioshin's frowned raised, then deepened. He could read into Terry's body language, the doctor was suspicious, maybe as suspicious as he was when Rebecca recently encountered him. "That _is_ my objective, you know."

"I mean like her _specially_." Terry said. "I don't know what her deal is, but I'm still conflicted about our falling out."

He is not wrong at all. The Kaioshin remained impartial. "I will."

"Thank you." Terry smiled. That smile was like letting loose a whole bunch of baggage. Zamasu, for the time being, has been turning off his telepathy more often for the sake of others privacy, so he doesn't read Rebecca's mind like he used to. Terry, despite Rebecca letting him off, still cares for the woman. The man had a big heart, and Zamasu knew that he was trying to be as transparent as possible with his thoughts. She was mostly shaken up from losing a friend before, but he should've dug deeper into that weird, twisted, and covert joyfulness she had when she entered her house. He came here to observe, and he'll do just that.

The Kaioshin nodded; this was not a promise, it was an affirmation. "No problem."

* * *

Later in the night, the Kaioshin needed to get his primitive mobile device, or _phone_ , in order to keep notes on what was going on with the guys because he was invited to their house party tomorrow. Even though he didn't need it, he promised to be more conservative rather than asking Jay what Mace's living room looked like and just appearing there. It was sitting on his nightstand in Irene's house, all he had to do was get it, wait for the green light to join them, and then bounce.

Upon seeing Irene's room, Zamasu found that the door was opened. Either she was in there at first and left, or the woman had gotten so birdbrained over the past week that she foregone her own habits. After he spent time with Terry, he teleported back to Irene's house, in her hallway, expecting to hear her badmouth everyone to her friends who weren't an extension of the main group that he knows.

Instead the house was quiet, which was nice, but her room was open, and it made Zamasu curious. He entered it and was quite surprised to see almost everything still in place; the room was nice and tidy, organized as it should be. He was going to leave it like that right before his eyes glazed over her drawer, and that was when he grew irritated.

Little known fact: Zamasu has been seeing these carts or boxes smooshed deep into her trash bins, some of them were turned inside out or conveniently covered with other trash. On two occasions, she came downstairs, mean mugged him, grabbed a whole empty trash bag, and then went back up before he could inquire. At first he didn't know what they were, but seeing a can and two bottles with the same labels as their respective boxes made his eye twitch; Irene was _drinking_.

She was petite and just shy of average height, he highly doubted that she _wasn't_ a lightweight. Not only that but he knew that Irene only preferred wine, like this woman wouldn't _touch_ beer or rum with a ten foot pole, but here he is, seeing a can and a bottle of beer plus a bottle of rum, all empty on her drawer. Her closet was slightly open, and he could spot something rubber-like and black that appeared to be slung against the inner doorknob. He opened her closet to see an unfinished bag, but an _alarming_ amount of boozes and alcoholic drinks alike. A mix of different beer and vodka laces made their way to his nose and he scrunched his whole face, not because of the smell, but because he was annoyed with how this idiot was 'coping'.

"Well, _hi._ "

He heard her fast footsteps as he opened her closet, and her graining, angered voice didn't scare him off either. He just turned his head with the same authority he'd use on Rebecca's dogs. He pointed down to the bag and the bottles repeatedely, his voice was smooth and quiet. "What is all this?"

If you ever had a guardian who found out about your shitty wrongdoings talk to you with a calm timbre like _that,_ you would run to the hills. Irene was more upset at the fact that he's standing in her room. What gives him the right to just _spawn_ in here? "Why are you here?"

"Answer my question, Irene." He turned around completely. His frown was set deep on his face. "What is all of this?" She stayed quiet, still giving him an angry, 'domineering' face as if he would be intimidated by it. He continued to press her. "Is this alcohol?"

"What'd'it look like?" She asked that, as if Zamasu was so dumb that he couldn't tell it was alcohol. She knew that he knew, but she didn't want to say 'yes', she didn't want to 'lose'.

Zamasu's jaw tensed. "Watch your mouth."

"I didn't curse."

"You don't have to curse to be disrespectful." Seriously, how narrow minded was she? "Are we going to go through this again? Have you not moved on?"

"I have moved on."

"No, you haven't." While she was raising her voice, he kept his voice calm. He had no reason to yell in order to garner attention. "If you've moved on, you wouldn't be complaining about it every day, you wouldn't be angry every day. You wouldn't be _drinking_ every day." He shook his head slightly, not out of pity. "You're still stuck."

She picked out a single statement to rebuke, as if that would make him look like he was wrong. "I don't drink everyday."

"With the amount of bottles and cans I see in this bag, and on your drawer, you might as well be drinking everyday." He took a step from the closet, both hands sitting folded on his back with his head tilted slightly. "Do you think this is okay?"

It's ironic that he adopted the _same_ stance Gowasu had whenever _he_ was being scolded.

"What does it matter to you?" She retorted, standing straighter. "You didn't give a shit a few months ago. Why are you pressing me now?"

"What was in the past, _is in the past._ " He furrowed his brows. "This isn't a healthy thing to do. It'll hurt you in the long run."

"You're not doing it."

"I'm _not_ , this isn't about me. What are you not getting?" Is she _really_ trying to deny how harsh she's reacting over her breakup, and the ending of a longstanding friendship?

"I'm not getting why you're now policing me over what I can and can't do." She crossed her arms. "I'm an adult; what I do is my choice, you can tell me otherwise. Get off my ass."

She was right; he _has_ no reason to make her do something else. But… "I'm not hanging over you, but what you are doing, as a lousy means to cope, is redundant."

"It's hurtful to lose someone just because they can't keep their pants buckled." Irene said, and the Kaioshin frowned, confused at what she meant, but she expanded. "Rebecca and he were having sex before, so that's why I broke up with him."

 _Ohhh, that's what she was getting at._ It made Zamasu even more confused because… "That happened before you two were a thi-"

"Oh, don't give me that bullshit! I know that she had spread her legs for him while we were together. Stop believing lies."

This is… ironic. "Who told you that?"

"I knew of it when Rebecca said it."

 _Rebecca said that, verbatim?_ "Have you had her mistaken, Irene?"

Yes, she did, but Rebecca was smart, she worded it elusively, not to give Irene a proper time frame as to when they had affairs. With her context, Irene quickly took it as them two doing each other during her relationship. So even if she said yes, Irene had no viable evidence from Rebecca to prove that wrong. The only evidence she had, was from the guys and Zamasu. Three out of the four have distanced themselves from her, with one of them cutting ties off completely, and the last one right in front of her is the most annoying one to deal with.

"It came out of her whorish mouth. I'm _dead serious_. You think I could live with that, huh?!" Irene seemed to look like, from her brown heated eyes, that she was faltering from her anger a bit, because she realized that that information was up in the air. This was where Zamasu himself started to backpedal from initiating any insults. He _actually_ wanted her to hear him out.

"You have her mistaken, Irene. There is no reason for her to bring that up, because it didn't happen while he was with you." Matter of fact, why _would_ Rebecca say that? The doctor knew of the things she did in the past, but apparently Irene had no idea about her involvements with James. It would make no sense for Rebecca to say that _if_ James was right there with her.

Unless it was to rile the both of them up...

Zamasu started to feel less grounded than he did before about Rebecca's mentality.

"You weren't there! You have no fucking idea what even happened!"

 _That_ snapped him out of his thoughts. Now he was getting angry. "I believe i do. Rebecca told me."

This was where she started to bitterly laugh. "Ohhh, so now you're taking words from that cunt herself? Do you _really_ think she would tell you the fucking truth? She's a liar, and an instigator."

Thirteen years... _thirteen years_ of friendship, and their parting causes _th_ is? If you ever have one bad argument with someone and they tell others that you aren't shit, not matter how long and deep your friendship was, _run far the hell away._

Patience is being lost, anger levels were rising… this is not a Zamasu anyone wants to be around. "Irene, _calm yourself down_. You're making no sense."

"I'm making perfect sense! You just don't know."

"Don't know what?"

"You've never lost shit in your life! So you have no idea what it feels like, to lose a partner and a friend because they're both snakes!" She spat out. Zamasu was on the verge… _ooh_ he was so close.

"It is not that big of a deal, especially in your situation. You do not need to _drink,"_ he started to move with his speech because he was that upset, "or wallow in shallow sorrow because of it."

"Cheating is fucking horrible! It's the worst thing to ever happen to someone!"

There were so many things wrong with that, especially because he's seen a number of people and have heard of people going through and dealing with harder struggles in better ways than she was. He thought about Alma who was neglected, Loki who was abused, Rebecca who had to crawl her reputation and self esteem back up, Ambrose who had his engagement smothered by his woman betraying him, James who has a hospitalized, lonely and misunderstood aunt- just _so many_ bigger things that would make someone as weak as Irene crumble and cry like a little bitch. And look at how the others now right now, they're at least functioning well enough to be polite and kind, Irene just feels like she can be a snob because her poor Prince wasn't being 'loyal'.

Irene had set the kettle boiling, now it was starting to topple with fire. "It is a terrible fucking thing to do, and your best friend sleeping with your significant other is too! Obviously you don't fucking know that-"

Zamasu took a step towards her. In the heat of her anger she didn't realize how imposing he looked. "What makes you think I can't know that?"

"Because you're a fucking sheltered priss, you don't know shit about the world around you and you sit on your ass thinking books will feed you experience!" She grew condescending, smug, thinking that that wouldn't get to the man who was now getting closer to her, "You don't know what betrayal feels like because you don't even have any friends or a girlfriend for that matter! I bet your dick's been limp all your sad ass li-"

 _SLAP!_

Loud enough to possibility make the walls of her ears tremble and the sides of her head quake, Irene's vision went spinning with her body before her ass hit the floor. Zamasu's hand was still in the air, not even stinging from slapping her right in the cheek. Leaning against her bed, she looked up at him with _such_ a hurt and fearful look that made him snarl in disgust; now she was trying to look like a victim, as if she didn't just straight up insult him.

He let it all out, he didn't fucking care about keeping his voice down. "Not only did you _dare me_ multiple times over the week, but you're now insulting _my_ body? Who the hell do you think you are?!" He balled his fists, not making a move to hit the weak woman. "You are not entitled to having an attitude with me over your meager problems. You're too snobby to realize that the entire world does not revolve around you, don't think someone wouldn't smack you over the dirt you throw on their face, I will not tolerate such nonsense. I had _enough_ of this, of _all_ this!" And then he leaned forward speaking louder, really beading the next words onto the flinching woman. " _Grow up_! You won't deserve _anything_ with that senseless behavior, _anything!_ You and that mouth of yours can go directly to hell. I'm done with your trashy act. Shameful..."

He had enough of her bullshit, he was _done_ , now all he had to do was get his phone (since the guys would badger him about it), and leave to Adrian's house. If slapping Irene was a wrong thing to do then he'll be damned, because he had enough of her foolishness from the _moment_ he saw her face. If a _God_ tells _you_ to _go to hell_ , you know it's serious.

Such weighted words shouldn't be uttered by someone like him, because… it can literally happen, but in the heat of the moment he didn't give her a sparing thought; Irene needed to be taught a lesson.

He walked out of her room, the whole house was quiet, and he headed to his quarters to get his phone. He turned it on and saw a hefty amount of messages… aka like 10. Ten messages is a _lot._

Adrian had told him that they planned on leaving for Mace's house tomorrow at 6, but to feel free to come around anytime around today's dusk. At the moment, it was 9:30, and Zamasu declined the offer because he was a little frizzled. Or a lot frazzled, rather; he didn't hear Irene exit her room, he didn't even hear any footsteps, but he felt he was resolute in what he did and she just needs the hard goddamned truth, even from a God that has no concern about her. He could swear up and down that her wellbeing meant nothing to him, she was supposed to be someone he hated without repercussion. Yet here he was, post-angry about finding out the bad habits Irene quickly adopted.

So… why did he care?

Maybe it's because he hates the acidity he has to deal with whenever he breathes in her premise, maybe it's because he doesn't like negative energy being put on him. Maybe he's been around so many successful and mentally strong people and has fortified care for them and what they stand for, so much so that he hates seeing the opposite on another person and wants that wrested immediately. He just absolutely hated what this damned woman has become, and with every day that passes she's just getting worse, worse enough to harm herself. And maybe he just didn't like seeing people harm themselves, whether it be cutting or drinking or starving themselves…

He just _didn't_ like seeing bad things being done by people, either to themselves or to others.

The real reason behind his actions right now was unknown, but he could _guess_ that it was something along the lines of those possibilities. Conflicted, he felt like he needed to take a breather somewhere else, at least far away from this place for the time being. It wouldn't be a fair game if he went directly to Adrian's home after all.

Pushing aside his thoughts, he left Irene's home by phasing into the sky, a hundred feet above her house, and he flew eastward to North City. He remembered seeing a hillside over an ocean during one of his sightsee flights, so he went there and sat on its edge. He watched the sea, formless and calm, and the wind felt nice against his skin. This place will suffice for several hours, at least until the unsure, tilting feeling in his gut would go away.

The ocean beneath his feet started to sway harder as his thoughts continued to travel.

l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l **•** l‾l

 **The ocean is a symbol of peace and stability, but because of its formlessness can represent chaos and the unpredictable. There's petty vengeance placed on Irene's head right now, and she and Zamasu have** _ **no idea.**_ **Zamasu himself still feels unsure with expressing deep emotions; anger is not exempt from that list, but he knows he cannot hold bad temperament to anything as a God.**

 **He cannot admit that despite her annoying ass, he genuinely does not like the way she handles things, and wants her to be better. He is actually a lot more compassionate in a complex way.**

 **There are two key things about Nousha and Naz that you need to remember; they are both half-humanoid an half-Mystics, so they don't have a bipartisan view of normal humanoid history, and are both members of Sruy Venka. Only the people who are born** _ **native**_ **to that island know of what happens there, and they are very powerful people.** _ **That is why both Nousha and Naz's power levels are undetectable.**_ **The same is said for Alma because she is also a member of the island, and she knows how to evade telepathy.**

 **Alrigtho, this one was very short but the next chapter will denote what happens at and after the party, and quick warning; it is** _ **long**_ **. Brace your eyes on the next update!**


End file.
